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Table of Contents
Able Greenspan's Bookshelf
Teaching and Learning Mathematics Online, 2nd Edition
James P. Howard II and John F. Beyers, editors
Chapman and Hall / CRC Press
c/o Routledge
https://www.routledge.com
9781032497754, $200.00, HC, 680pp
https://www.amazon.com/Teaching-Learning-Mathematics-Online-Howard/dp/1032504536
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/teaching-and-learning-mathematics-online-james-p-howard-ii/1135744366
Synopsis: Collaborative compiled and co-edited by academicians James P. Howard II and John F. Beyers, "Teaching and Learning Mathematics Online: Second Edition" continues to present meaningful and practical solutions for teaching mathematics and statistics online. It focuses on the problems observed by mathematics instructors currently working in the field who strive to hone their craft and share best practices with the community. This newly expanded second edition of "Teaching and Learning Mathematics Online" provides a set of standard practices, improving the quality of online teaching and the learning of mathematics. Mathematic instructors/teachers (as well as students) will benefit from learning new techniques and approaches to delivering content.
New to this newly updated and expanded second edition of "Teaching and Learning Mathematics Online" are
Nine brand new chapters
Reflections on the lessons of COVID-19
Explorations of new technological opportunities
Critique: The twenty-nine erudite contributions are deftly organized into five major sections (Course Design; Student Interactions; Using Technology; Teacher Education; Commentary). There is also a three page listing of the contributors and their credentials, as well as a fourteen page Index. Exceptionally well organized and presented, "Teaching and Learning Mathematics Online: 2nd Edition" is unreservedly recommended for personal, professional, and college/university library Mathematics Instruction/Education collections and curriculum studies lists. It should be noted for students, academia, and math curriculum instructors that this new and expanded second edition of "Teaching and Learning Mathematics Online" from CRC Press is also available in paperback (9781032504537, $69.99) and in a digital book format (Kindle, $53.19).
Editorial Note #1: James P. Howard, II is a multifaceted professional with extensive experience in data science, consulting, teaching, and community service. He has previously worked as a consultant to various United States government agencies, including the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Executive Office of the President, and the Department of Homeland Security. Additionally, he served as an internal consultant on scientific computing for the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.
Editorial Note #2: John F. Beyers, PhD, is Program Chair and Professor of Mathematics and Statistics at the University of Maryland Global Campus (formerly UMUC). Dr. Beyers leads a global department of 200+ faculty to serve the educational needs of over 20,000 non-traditional, under-represented undergraduate students globally. He is responsible for new program development, curriculum planning, teaching effectiveness and Learning Outcomes Assessment. Prior to his current position, Dr Beyers was the Associate Director for the Center of Distance Education at Johns Hopkins University.
Able Greenspan
Reviewer
Diane Donovan's Bookshelf
The Cassatt Sisters
Lisa Groen
https://lisagroen.com
Black Rose Writing
www.blackrosewriting.com
9781685136598, $21.95, PB, 270pp
https://www.amazon.com/Cassatt-Sisters-Novel-Love-Art/dp/1685136591
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-cassatt-sisters-lisa-groen/1147590375
Are love affairs merely an opportunity to see the way we mislead ourselves?
Readers who choose Lisa Groen's historical novel for its artistic insights will find powerful, thought-provoking reflections - like this early opening line - that deepen the story. The result elevates the artistic focus, turning it into a transformative personal experience.
The Cassatt Sisters: A Novel of Love and Art will delight historical fiction readers seeking a moving portrait of Mary Cassatt, her sister Lydia, Edgar Degas, and their evolving roles within the blossoming Impressionist art community.
One notable strength of The Cassatt Sisters is its first-person narrative, which brings the people, times, and artistic connections to life. Readers with some familiarity of Impressionist culture will especially appreciate how Groen weaves social reflections into her story:
Les avant-gardes, the breakaway artists Durand-Ruel supported, openly defied the Salon, a juried exhibition that for centuries set standards and shaped careers. I, too, had set my sights on the Salon when I'd arrived by steamer from Philadelphia thirteen years prior. The jury had accepted one of my paintings when I was only twenty-four. I remember thinking, surely my career will flourish.
Personal and cultural connections are created, and perspectives and choices are enhanced not just through historical reflection, but through Impressionist artworks that pepper the tale with important illustrative value.
This adds a personal touch as readers follow Mary's journey and the evolution of her professional and personal objectives:
The exhibit, the reviews, and my new friends invigorated me. I rededicated myself to the work, to present more paintings the following year. I woke and slept in a world of new ideas, including printmaking, which took more time than I imagined.
More than most other novels about the era and its people, The Cassatt Sisters focuses on the psychological profiles of two sisters, along with the lovers and artists who were part of their inner circle.
Details are also given about Cassatt's artistic creations, exploring not only the philosophy behind her art but the physical process of creating it - and how evolving relationships can influence and change an artist's focus:
I walked to my studio. I missed making prints, especially the mystery of not knowing what a picture would look like until peeling paper from the plate. I'd tucked away the copper plates Camille had given me in a supply cupboard because I didn't have the tools and equipment to continue as I had in Edgar's studio, but I'd return to it, eventually.
The Cassatt Sisters will appeal to, and is highly recommended for, fiction enthusiasts interested in Impressionist times and art. By weaving together the social, artistic, personal, and political worlds, Groen has created a mesmerizing story. It requires no prior in-depth familiarity with the era to be accessible (though art history readers will especially appreciate the profundity of these artists' lives and revelations).
Libraries seeking historical novels to recommend to book clubs and reading circles - with interests ranging from women's lives and careers to the arts and, in particular, Impressionist history - will find The Cassatt Sisters a standout.
Replete with emotional interactions that bring the sisters and their world to life, The Cassatt Sisters is hard to put down, intensely revealing, and a work of art itself. It stands out from most other Cassatt approaches, whether biographies, art history titles, or fictionalized explorations.
Saving Maria
Truant D. Memphis
TDM, Ink
9798986893938, $15.00 Paperback/$1.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Saving-Maria-Truant-D-Memphis/dp/B0FH38VBDL
Saving Maria will attract readers of speculative fiction attracted to powerful stories steeped in irony, strong characters, and situations that simmer with thought-provoking passages.
The first-person narrator introduces the Canadian setting with a wry observational style that emerges within a few sentences of description:
Inside an intimate sanctuary dressed in warm colors and illuminated by the soft light of candle flame, a man sits quietly, deep in a meditation used to fulfill the requirements of sleep. So deep, in fact, that in this instance he is asleep. An unusual occurrence gaining regularity of late.
This sets the stage for further "unusual occurrences" as a team of diminutive monkeys ("Tiny furry poopers") supplement an ineffectual alarm with their own assault to raise Littlethumb Brooks from his too-deep sleep:
To the man's left, three tamarin monkeys wearing kung fu uniforms sit in the lotus position with their eyes closed. Their names are Sir Alister Pickney, Stevie Two Sharks, and Zeus.
Philosophical reflection emerges as characters such as Daring Bird contemplate their choices, decisions, and impact:
Did he really love her? You're goddamn right he did. Goddamn right. For this particular subject, that's the one thought that matters. The rest are bullshit, exercises in futility, yet unavoidable, and consistently reoccurring. He can't control the ability of these thoughts to spring forth within him, all he can control is how he reacts to them.
Readers receive multifaceted threads of subplots that range from numbers games and the issue of Littlethumb's being blocked artistically to Xander's lament over time's passage:
I won't be so melodramatic as to tell you this is the longest two minutes of Xander's life, but Xander will. Oh, the horror. Two minutes! My god, the entire world could change in two minutes. Galaxies collide! Universes are birthed into existence!
Viewpoints shift from observer to events in a thought-provoking manner. This adds subliminal attraction and insights to a story which moves back and forth through time and experience:
Imagine Littlethumb speaking breathlessly and continually picking up steam as he tries to explain a metaphysical spiritual occurrence in less than two minutes. "The world wasn't frozen. I thought it was. My family, they appeared frozen in time. I could hear their hearts beating, but the sound was from very far away..."
Readers who imagine a surreal landscape filled with the ebbs and flows of shifting moments of hope, salvation, and discovery (that move through subjects of stolen art, surprise combat training, Littlethumb's deaf wife Maria, and humanistic networks) will find that all these events and more create a mercurial landscape that proves a page-turner.
Libraries seeking literary explorations of widower reflection paired with speculative fiction's best representation of surreal atmosphere will welcome Saving Maria.
Saving Maria is simply outstanding, highly recommended for readers interested in magical realism and characters that navigate the ground of expectations and assumptions which are continually moving under their feet as a murder is forgiven and its impact ripples into life.
Control. Move. Dominate.
Larry Barnhill with Jerry Payne
BnB Holdings Publishing LLC
9798992388206 $15.99 paperback, $9.99 Kindle
https://www.amazon.com/Control-Move-Dominate-Story-Morning/dp/B0FL5W2LL2
How do you go from a beautiful house in a gated community to a room in a federal penitentiary?
Control. Move. Dominate. The True Story of the Morning Glory Boys follows author Larry Barnhill's descent from a corporate American success story to a criminal, and represents the vividness of true crime writing at its best.
Readers anticipating yet another confessional about good intentions gone awry will find that Barnhill presents his experiences with a twist:
...the real story isn't so much how I destroyed my lifestyle; the real story is how I let my lifestyle destroy me.
As Barnhill hones his professional, methodical approach to directing bank heists, imparting this sense of expertise to bank personnel who knew that if they cooperate, nobody will be hurt, an intriguing sense of purpose is delivered that differentiates his crimes from those of less seasoned or deliberate criminals.
This gives readers a novel foundation for considering not just crime and its outcome, but the choices, impact, and approaches that involves the varied nature of criminal acts and places it in the perspective of lifestyle values and motivations.
The danger is greatest when "one last job" is contemplated and the risk-taking ramps up. So it was on one fateful day, when Barnhill and his cohorts made a mistake that finally landed them in prison for nearly thirty years.
Of special note is how business approaches meld with criminal intention to hone Barnhill's craft in unexpected ways:
The whole thing had to be pulled off in under one minute and ten seconds. Little by little I found myself taking control of the training. My corporate background kicked in. This was another business operation, as far as I was concerned. And I was determined to make sure we did it fucking right. The plan was three parts and simple as pie: Control. Move. Dominate.
How this mandate carries forward into confrontation, escape, prison life, and new discoveries creates surprising threads of inspection and revelation that supercharges this book with more than just a singular approach to crime, sentencing, and redemption.
As truths about robberies and a "perception business" that drives an impossible image of success emerges from the action (and among the options Barnhill chooses for his life), readers anticipating any form of whodunit (or why) receive a story harrowingly thought-provoking as the lifestyle component of the real crime emerges.
Barnhill's involvement with Atlanta's notorious "Morning Glory Boys," a gang which robbed banks with unparalleled precision and unbeatable results for over a decade, illustrates many facets, from gang involvement and criminal training to how an approach to bank robbing transformed the nature of bank crime and criminal pursuit.
The lifestyle motivation and image which lies at the heart of Barnhill's involvements and choices is icing on the cake of action and reaction. This builds an exceptionally vivid, thought-provoking story as it explores heists and high-level social and political hobnobbing.
Libraries interested in true crime and gang sagas that are delivered with a far deeper message suitable for book club reading groups and beyond will welcome Control. Move. Dominate. to their shelves. Its ability to attract through more than just criminal experience makes for its top recommendation far over and above most bank heist confessionals.
Larry's achievement of his goal by participating in this memoir is a potent acknowledgement of his ultimate, newly refined, powerfully delivered, revised life's purpose:
My hope is that my life might serve as an example of, first, the consequences of bad choices and, second, the potential for redemption and the unbridled possibilities of better choices.
Be A Dance Artist Your Own Way
Joyce Liao
Forestlight Books
https://artsvoice.wixsite.com/joyce-liao/publication
9798999269300, $22.95
https://www.amazon.com/Dance-Artist-Your-Own-Way/dp/B0FKGPQ62B
Until Be A Dance Artist Your Own Way, aspiring young dancers had relatively few artistic books that encouraged them to creatively explore the dance world's many possibilities. Sure, there are many practical manuals on how to become a dancer, but few survey such related opportunities as choreography, making dance videos, or writing dance critiques.
That's why Joyce Liao's Be A Dance Artist Your Own Way stands out from the crowd. Its wider embrace of the world of dance and its encouraging, enthusiastic tone exploring the many opportunities that are seldom discussed in competing dance "how to" guides provides children and preteens with an encouraging review of different jobs in dance.
Take the chapter 'Make Creativity a Daily Habit.' Young dancers are advised to move beyond dance routine assignments to hone their own creative results:
As dancers, we should feel empowered to be as creative as possible with dance. In a dance class, a teacher or a choreographer usually has the steps ready for us. Instead of deciding what we want to dance or how we want to express ourselves, we are given a set of instructions and steps to follow. Even though performing other people's work can be a great learning experience, we should also take opportunities to create our own dances whenever possible. There is a great bonus when you are a dancer with choreographic or improvisational skills - you can create your own dances!
Liao also tackles the task of uncovering wellsprings of inspiration:
Attending live performances or workshops is a great way to meet new people and expand our exposure to diverse dance styles and practices.
Her inclusion of workbook exercises encourages young dangers to think about what forms and attributes of dance make them happy:
Has a real-life event, not directly related to dance, ever influenced or altered the way you moved or expressed yourself in art? Do you believe that profound life experiences will make an artist's work deeper and more powerful?
The result is way beyond the usual discussion of the art of dancing, probing the art of building a better life.
Libraries seeking uplifting, inspirational guides that answer the question "why dance?" will find Be A Dance Artist Your Own Way a powerful acquisition. It will spark all kinds of group discussions and is the perfect creative juice-maker for aspiring young artists.
Any adult seeking to nudge a would-be young dancer into the dance world will embrace the bigger picture thinking represented in Be A Dance Artist Your Own Way. Discussions help break the image of traditional, set rules and approaches to the art of dance, reinventing them in new ways.
Lively, positive, thought-provoking, and perfect for artistic expansion, Liao's messages are bright, shining stars that stand beside and enhance other dance books, capturing the delight and possibilities of honing one's art in a unique, compelling way:
Dance is an art that requires open-mindedness as dancemaking thrives in new possibilities. While it may seem surprising, staying open-minded can sometimes be a challenge in dance. Why? There are numerous reasons, but one that significantly affects young dancers is the formation of tight-knit social circles or cliques within dance schools and dance communities. When small circles or cliques form in a dance community, social expectations or peer pressure may hinder our ability to keep an open mind, preventing us from considering a broad range of diverse values or voices.
Al's Journey
Marin
Fontreal
https://www.ingramcontent.com
9781989661468, $24.99(Hardcover); $16.99 (Paperback)
$2.99 (Ebook); $2.99 (Audiobook)
https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marin-Darmonkow/author/B08PRTY7LB
Al's Journey is the gorgeous picture book story of villagers who become so enamored of gold that they forget the real importances in life. Sound familiar? This theme has appeared in children's books before, but Marin tackles the subject from the perspective of a young orphan (perhaps destined to be the next tribal healer) tasked with finding a way to heal by leading his people in a new direction.
His grandfather, a wise healer and shaman who purports to talk with God, has trained his grandson well. Al is charged with climbing a summit to speak with God himself. Led by a magical pathway of fireflies that originate from good luck water, Al and his grandfather embark on a journey that forces Al to acknowledge his increasing strength and abilities.
As he protects his grandfather from the elements and finally reaches his goal, Al's three questions define the mission he must undertake to save his people.
Marin accompanies this story of life lessons with dark, brooding graphic art that reinforces Al's mission and revelations. This adds force to the notion that the story is not one of brightness and color, but one of thought-provoking insights into the nature of not only God, but those who follow and seek to lead themselves.
Adults choosing Al's Journey for read-aloud discussion will find many topics can be raised with the very young. These range from spiritual reflections about the nature and mystery of God to identifying values in life and absorbing wisdom that comes from questions, unpredictable answers, and insights.
There is no pat ending to this story. Readers of all ages likely won't anticipate its progression or opportunities for discourse and contemplation.
These elements make Al's Journey highly recommended for picture book readers whose read-aloud adults can guide them towards bigger-picture thinking in a thought-provoking series of not just one, but many blossoming insights. These are perfect for young readers' enlightenment and operate on many thought-provoking levels.
To Save A Life
Larry Zuckerman
Cynren Press
www.cynren.com
9781947976566, $18.00 paperback
https://www.cynren.com/catalog/p/to-save-a-life
To Save a Life is a historical novel about immigration and survival. It considers the quandary of fleeing one form of repression only to endure another in a land that is supposed to hold the ideal of freedom.
In 1909, Malka Kaminsky flees Russia with her dowry for a new life in America. Her involvement in a sweatshop strike introduces her to fellow Russian Jew Yaakov Rogovin, who also seeks success in this new world while bringing baggage from his past.
Their cultural connections join them together in an unexpected way based on their dreams of a successful future in their new home. A perhaps-inevitable connection evolves between them which is based on the shared value of independence - a goal shaken when Malka's fiance from the old country arrives with his own mandate in mind.
Fighting to let go of yesterday even when it follows her into her future, Malka confronts what is possible, what has been ordained for her life, and how to build her own independence apart from the guilt and ties of her past.
Larry Zuckerman crafts a realistic, thoroughly engrossing saga of 1900s New York that weaves different perspectives into Malka's story. The social issues that arise as these diverse experiences are explored examine many new possibilities for revised lives emerging from shifting social and political influences:
If only they could study music and not be factory slaves.
Especially inviting is how Malka's business vision juxtaposes with Yaakov's views on unconventional pursuits. This will create important discussion points for book clubs interested in how traditions are set aside and new ones built from their ashes by immigrants faced with not just new choices, but new relationships.
Libraries looking for novels about turn-of-the-century Jewish immigrants and women who forge new paths of discovery and entrepreneurial opportunity in a land not always kind to their status will find To Save a Life a compelling collection addition.
More so than most fiction about New York Jews and immigrants during this period of time, To Save a Life considers a variety of societal and interpersonal influences on building revised lives which will serve as perfect book club discussion points.
Replete with a wide range of insights, from women's liberation and freedoms to Russian Jewish immigrant lives and experiences, the dreams launched from inauspicious beginnings and conditions, and the musical influences that fostered dreams and new connections, To Save a Life's special blend of personal, social, and political revelations makes for involving, unforgettable, and thoroughly immersive reading.
A Life in the Sunshine
J. Everett Prewitt
Independently Published
https://eprewitt.com
9798990130128, $17.95 Paperback/$3.99 eBook
https://eprewitt.com/a-life-in-the-sunshine
A Life in the Sunshine represents uplifting autobiography at its best as ex-military African-American writer J. Everett Prewitt surveys his life's ups and downs. From the start, Prewitt provides an uplifting focus on conjoining his life's adventures and ventures with ultimate positivity:
My life has been a series of blessings, but it has also been fraught with pitfalls, self-inflicted wounds, life-threatening circumstances, and other adverse situations not always of my making. But in every unfortunate incident, I could feel the cumulative strength of my ancestors enabling me to prevail.
These messages, embedded in family and social experience, are needed today, now more than ever, as the memoir traverses adversity and growth opportunities.
The landscape of experience follows Prewitt's experiences from Ohio University in the 1960s to military life, pairing vignettes of encounters and opportunities with insights on relationships between Blacks and whites:
I called the white director who had made the comment and asked him where he had received his information. After hemming and hawing, I interrupted. "Here's what I need you to do. I need you to write a letter to each person attending that presentation and apologize for the misinformation. As soon as we get off the phone, I also need you to call the director and tell her your information was false." I got the market study job but only because I corrected a lie.
Color photos from the author's collection permeate his memoir, adding rich insights and examples to attract readers who may arrive unfamiliar with Prewitt, but who will depart with many acquired insights about the wellsprings of his inspiration.
Libraries seeking memoirs from African American authors who review their encounters with prejudice, their mindsets for perseverance and overcoming limitations, and their encounters with serendipitous events which emphasize that it's truly a small world will find A Life in the Sunshine uplifting, thought-provoking, and absorbing.
Steeped in stories of youth, growing up, relationship-building, and life encounters, A Life in the Sunshine is just the ticket for an involving read. It surveys a life spent confronting racism, building relationships, and persisting in absorbing uplifting moments and influences that all lead to better living.
As a lesson plan in survival and values-building, A Life in the Sunshine shines.
The Boy with the Jade
Charles Bush
HTF Publishing
9781963452211, $33.95 Hardcover/$18.95 Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Boy-Jade-Charles-Bush/dp/1963452216
The Boy with the Jade is set in 18th century China. It will delight historical fiction fans with its story of Jia Baoyu, "born with a jade in his mouth" (or so his grandmother's legend maintains), who is destined for not just inherited opulence, but turmoil.
The physical jade which follows him through life does seem to hold magical abilities - or, perhaps they stem from familial support and serendipity. No matter the origins of his wealth, Baoyu finds his world disintegrating in a series of emotional and social confrontations. Suddenly he is depressed, beaten, betrayed, and holds in question everything he's been raised to believe in and be.
Baoyu turns to Taoism and Buddhism in search of a revised life purpose. There he discovers that the intersection of philosophy and life is marred by family heritage and expectation that stems from social and political circles, effectively trapping him in a world he only wants to exit.
Charles Bush crafts a first-person experience which imparts hard-hitting words of wisdom as Baoyu confronts the fact that his destiny and his desire are two very different things:
...at the apex of the examination system, at least in one province, was the very man I least respected in the world. The father who constantly berated me, who had beaten me to within a gnat's wing of death, who had not even cared to ask whether a lurid accusation leveled at me was true.
The system had set up my father as the model toward which we were all striving. I shuddered. This could not possibly be what Confucius had intended.
He builds the Jia clan legacy in ways that even readers with little to no Chinese familiarity will learn from and easily absorb, creating in Baoyu a character whose heritage and psyche clash with the expectation of the role he should assume. Bush injects psychological traumas and recovery processes which neatly layer atop the character's resolve to "keep my life on an even emotional keel, to detached, to avoid the extremes of elation or depression."
Readers receive insights through applied philosophical ideals with forays into Chinese aristocracy that examine legacy, despair, the value of wealth and power, and family power. The moral and ethical examinations Baoyu is forced to confront in the course of trying to adhere to his familial and cultural expectations while remaining true to himself are particularly thought-provoking:
...filial piety was a value, but not the only value in the moral universe. Other values a person might legitimately pursue included spiritual growth, the extinguishment of desire, and the end of suffering.
The result is a lively, engrossing story of self-discovery and social expectations which will find a home in any library strong in Chinese historical novels and tales of philosophical, cultural, and social evolution.
Readers interested in considerations of self-growth under repressive expectations of all kinds will find The Boy with the Jade as compelling a read as book clubs looking for discussion points about Chinese dynasties, family pressures, and individual transformation.
A Stone's Throw
Wayne Edwards
Quantum Shift Publishing
978955533263, $21.95 Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Stones-Throw-heartwarming-grandfather-adversity/dp/1955533261
A Stone's Throw, written in the era of the 1960s, gives young adults a novel experience as twelve-year-old Maggie Stone is taken in by her best friend's family when her mother collapses. From there, she goes to an orphanage before the unexpected appearance of a grandfather she had never met, only to be swept from her familiar life in San Francisco and shuttled to his ranch in the wild and remote plains of eastern Montana..
Wayne Edwards tells Maggie's story in the first person, which helps readers absorb her fast-changing world and its unexpected transformation:
First, my mom abandoned me by burying herself in an eight week spell. And then, just when I'm getting comfortable staying at my best friend Cho's house, her parents shuttle me off to the worst place I've ever been - an orphanage!
And now? I'm lying in a smelly motel room next to a scary old grandpa who before now never even acknowledged my existence. And when he does finally make an appearance, he kidnaps me off to a middle-of-nowhere ranch a thousand miles away.
Convinced that her mother is in "a spell" that will dissipate so life can return to normal, Maggie writes letters to her mother and plans for a very different future than seems destined at this point. At the same time, she and Ira are forced to better understand each other and the impact of long-ago decisions and family ties as time moves on and ranch chores are supplemented by new understandings between them.
Edwards crafts the realistic story of a young girl faced with a possible lifetime change in her mother's condition and ability to be present in her world. He excels in depicting two very different personalities and environments which pose challenging adaptation requirements to not just Maggie, but her grandfather Ira.
As she interacts with peers at school, faces a possible first romance, and navigates the emotional trauma of an absent mother who continues to fade a little at a time due to distance and health, Maggie's world comes alive, immersing YA readers in a compelling story of change, connection, and growth.
Libraries and bookstores seeking novels about revised living situations which pose unexpected issues for everyone involved will find A Stone's Throw a powerful tale of adaptive living. It presents a realistic, warm character in young Maggie while fostering insights into familial estrangement.
Filled with new experiences and discoveries, A Stone's Throw is an engaging read that examines the outer limits of family connection and commitment, and will attract YA reading groups with its survey of a vastly revised life. While written primarily for a YA audience, this heartwarming story is very much an enjoyable story for adults of all ages.
Leonie's Leap: A Liberation Journey
Marzia Pasini
Atmosphere Press
www.atmospherepress.com
9798891326224, $14.99 pb, $7.99 ebook, $23.99 hc
https://www.amazon.com/Leonies-Leap-Liberation-Marzia-Pasini/dp/B0DWZNN74M
Leonie's Leap: A Liberation Journey provides readers with the moving story of fifteen-year-old Hungarian orphan Leonie, who escapes from an orphanage to become a circus acrobat in an environment that builds family and new connections.
He strives for physical and mental flawlessness, comes to realize that such a pursuit is limiting and hopeless, and adopts a "stratagem for acceptance rather than a ridiculous fixation" that serves him well in his journey. He pursues truth and makes leaps of faith and love as his training as an acrobat propels him towards life realizations that ultimately transform his psyche and experience.
Marzia Pasini integrates spiritual and philosophical reflection with Leonie's leaps, placing the access and interest of this novel both within and beyond YA audiences to reach well into adult reading circles. His approach creates a story that is packed with appeal and insight that its intended YA audience will find accessible, understandable, and compelling.
The depth and details about Leonie's "wild aspirations" and "sweet hypotheticals" adds poetic description and metaphor to his journey, probing the foundations of achievement, disillusion, and self-realization.
Juxtaposing his story are reflective insights that reinforce its philosophical and spiritual growth components, creating a smoothly-flowing discourse of realization especially well suited for YA book club circles as well as adult reading groups:
Dearheart, I know trusting is harder than hoping. Yet, trust is the seed from which certainty grows. Now, certainty doesn't dangle from the fragile thread of hope; it surpasses trust and conquers doubt. It's this rock-solid belief in the invincibility of the human spirit that keeps you buoyant and truly alive. When you nurture a deep sense of certainty about who you truly are, your confidence becomes unshakable.
The result is a vivid story of leaping into the unknown for a better life and more thoughtful results that will especially appeal to libraries, YA literature classes, and readers seeking contemporary stories delivered with thought-provoking, inspirational reflection.
Leonie's Leap isn't just a saga of venturing into the unknown. It's about embracing the rudiments of achievement and change in a manner that reflect into the world with revised approaches to life itself, making for a powerful consideration of choice, impact, and definitions of success.
The Electronic Tsunami
R. Michael Conley
Beaver's Pond Press
www.BeaversPondPress.com
9781643435312, $24.95
https://itascabooks.com/products/the-electronic-tsunami-1
The Electronic Tsunami is apocalyptic fiction, but not science fiction. Its chronicle of an all-too-possible perfect storm of digital and environmental disaster creates a powerful intersection between known facts and possible (probable?) outcomes. This will prove devastatingly thought-provoking for readers interested in the potential results of disastrous historical choices.
The story opens with a novice American president trying to field an increasingly deadly perfect storm of threats. It opens in 2029, where a senior risk officer at a cybersecure facility faces his worst nightmare - a successful hacking attempt that places not just his facility, but America and the entire world at risk.
Balances of world power teeter, President Lyman MacAlister faces challenges none of his predecessors could have predicted, and cyber-ransom attacks buffet an already-failing world as action-packed scenarios involve a wide group of individuals attempting to salvage society under impossible conditions.
From AI's involvement in the cyber-attack to strategic maneuvering in oceans around the world that bring climate change and Arctic political positions on a collision course, The Electronic Tsunami creates a powerful series of confrontations and realizations that poses individual players, world forces, and nature's retaliation in novel and unpredictable ways.
R. Michael Conley builds a fast-paced story powered by thriller-style cat-and-mouse games and fine tension, psychological conundrums that keep all players on an uneven field of flux and change, and realistic scenarios that represent some of humanity's worst nightmares.
Readers of disaster stories, thrillers, apocalyptic novels, and powerfully rendered scenarios will delight in the many modern dilemmas and possibilities that entwine as this world moves into unexpected conclusions and confrontations on all sides.
Libraries seeking a singularly unique foray into a perfect storm of digital, environmental, and political degradation will want to welcome The Electronic Tsunami into their collections as one of the more forceful, compelling reads of 2025.
Replete with geopolitical clashes and realizations, thought-provoking possibilities, and presidential emergency measures that not only confront invaders but stem from an EMT attack that changes the world, The Electronic Tsunami is thoroughly vivid, completely engrossing, and the very definition of edge-of-your-seat reading.
Cover For Me
Steven Schindler
The Elevated Press
www.TheElevatedPress.com
9780966240887, $17.00 Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Cover-Me-Steven-Schindler/dp/096624088X
Cover For Me opens in a World War II Hoboken war factory, so readers might presume from this start that the novel will be one of military engagement alone. It's not. It's as much a story of commitment, shifting values, and a wartime climate that shapes and buffets Georgie Paolini's personality and choices and those of his friend Johnny as it is a story of World War II's special milieu and challenges. As such, the plot is delivered with a cloak of historical backdrop that impacts the viewpoints of a likeable character whose reactions are supported by history.
Other characters provide their experiences, embracing belief systems that lead them to work hard and cultivate a "can do" attitude for the sake of a unified war effort at home:
Vito was hardly ever home, except to sleep. The government was desperate for the rubber the factory provided, and the pressure on him was enormous. He realized the gravity of the situation, and was proud that he kept the plant running as smoothly as it did in the war effort. He was working sixty, seventy, eighty-hour weeks. At times, he even slept in his office. But in his mind, he did what he had to do, as he always did, for God, country, and his family.
Readers don't remain in the war (or, with Georgie), however. As the decades pass into the 1960s, recovery and change continue to move Americans into new eras and realizations. Georgie's friend Johnny pursues his musical dreams alone as he tries to set aside his wartime experiences and the impact of injustice and Georgie's fate. The long-lasting shock of Georgie's choices and absence contribute to Johnny's feeling "responsible for everything" as he muses about "what if," had situations turned out differently. Music provides notes to his days as Johnny takes a stand and pursues uncomfortable truths about what really happened to Georgie during the war.
More so than most World War II novels, Steven Schindler juxtaposes the moral and ethical quandaries that arise from war actions into the fabric of society in America and abroad, creating a thought-provoking story filled with considerations and revelations readers won't see coming.
Libraries seeking World War II novels that stand out from the crowd by pursing the long-lasting impacts of military choices and the secrets and quandaries of overseas experience will welcome Cover For Me's multifaceted story of deception and truth.
Filled with believable characters backed by real history and packed with emotional connection, Cover For Me is an engaging story of music, miracles, and men who fulfill their obligations and friendships in unusual, powerful ways.
Cora and Martha and Other Stories
Thomas Penn Johnson
Atmosphere Press
www.atmospherepress.com
9798891327191, $15.99 Paperback/$24.99 Hardcover/$7.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Martha-Other-Stories-Thomas-Johnson/dp/B0FBR8K2FV
Cora and Martha and Other Stories features small-town protagonists in various roles that explore community experience in America from the Depression to modern times. Cora and Martha are neighbors and best friends who are now in their sixties when the collection opens. They remunerate on the front porch, interacting with other women and men on the block and fielding the liquor police, when their efforts are betrayed by an unusual in-house assailant.
Their ironic story turns to that of twenty-one-year-old Tommy Hunt in 'The Wages of Sin,' who seems destined to become a public speaker and preacher as effective as the many Lutherans who have come before him. His choice for a first sermon will literally knock the underpinnings from a savvy community in this surprise story of unexpected choices and results.
The chronological movement of these lives creates a pleasing backdrop for community interactions and ironies. This contrasts well in stories such as 'The Simon Story,' set in 1971, about a young man who moves in circles "of an unusual class," navigating multicultural opportunities and environments as he pursues music, relationships, and social change with equal observational flair.
Each story captures a microcosm of life and social interactions where cultural experience enters into community interactions in unusual, realistic ways.
It's as if Thomas Penn Johnson well knew all of his characters, from their background histories and the motivations for choices they make to the overall American milieu of social change that sets the stage for their actions. Perhaps he does.
Libraries that select this short story collection for its promise of Black community foundations and insights will find its wider embrace includes much more than Black lives alone.
Readers seeking juxtapositions of time, place, purpose, and discovery will welcome how Cora and Martha and Other Stories weaves together the social fabric of these individual lives and times. This makes for a powerful collection of reflective experience that will appeal widely to audiences interested in American lives and emerging community changes.
Behind the Star
Chad Gregory
Independently Published
www.hmdpublishing.com
9798285195115, $22.99 Hardcover/$4.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Behind-Star-Mastering-Stand-Thriving/dp/B0F9XPYQ9G
Behind the Star: A Guide to Mastering the Craft of Stand-In Work and Thriving Beyond the Set is for anyone who dreams of becoming involved in a cooperative, creative production. Yes, it explores the career opportunities, experiences, and challenges of operating as a stand-in on a Hollywood set while honing a life offstage - but that's just its overlay. Within the coverage of stand-in work lies the beating heart of struggle, quiet heroism and determination, and professional and personal boundary-pushing which makes this book both a passionately-written standout and impossible to easily categorize.
Behind the Star is not just about honing more savvy career moves in the industry. It's about the nuts and bolts, frustrations, challenges, and call to action and perseverance that besets behind-the-scenes action in Hollywood and buffets the ordinary actor and production participant. In this, its advice moves between experience, self-help guidance, attitude adjustment and consideration, and vivid storytelling of how shows come to life or fail on the backs of those who participate in their production.
Film crews will readily recognize the hilarious moments, set snafus, and brutal stage encounters that Chad Gregory outlines in the course of injecting practical suggestions because many are 'learn by example' moments that will feel familiar:
Stand-ins are expected to be punctual, professional, and flexible. You must be reliable, ready to work long hours, and adapt to various tasks. Production schedules are tight, and there is no time for folks who are not absolutely serious about what's required.
Descriptions of impossible circumstances, arduous work, tough decisions, and confrontations with self and others bring the real work of crews, actors, and producers to life, adopting a no-nonsense approach to depicting just how and where the challenges originate. Physical and mental marks require perfection from all involved to achieve seamless results. Gregory captures a sense of rules which often go beyond challenging to enter into the realm of brutal experience and assessments:
Simple, brutal, and dead-on. These rules are the stand-in's gospel, and living it takes a level of focus that's next to ninja-like.
From the fine art of being a stand-in actor or crewmember and its glory and pitfalls to how not to get fired, applying Hollywood lessons to everyday life, and building a reputation and life on- and off-stage, Behind the Star is one of the most realistic, compelling surveys you'll find, juxtaposing candid reflection and practical tips with vividly rendered real-world encounters.
Novices, especially, will appreciate the built-in practical advice that shows how best to be an effective stand-in:
Stand-ins don't just park on a mark. You must know why you're there. Watch the pros on set, analyzing how they move and listen. I've seen rookies pick up tricks just by eyeballing a veteran stand-in who knew when to shift without being told. Ask the AD or a friendly PA between takes, "Hey, what's the trick to nailing this?" They'll toss you a nugget if you're not a pest. Research is your buddy, too. Dig into the filmmaker's past projects. IMDB is a goldmine. If you're on a Spielberg gig, check out Jaws or ET. What's their pace? Do they use big crews or tight ships?
Whether considering the politics and process of reputation-building to attacking the daily grind and pressures of the industry, Gregory's book delves deep beneath the process of becoming to consider the sometimes-grueling ideals, hopes, and dreams that simmer under the set.
From acting to ethics and beyond, Gregory crafts a user-friendly, inviting guide to Hollywood practicalities that will help all levels of actors (stand-in or not) navigate 'Tinsel Town' and its often-unspoken rules, simultaneously adding a pro's observations of common novice snafus. These kinds of candid observations are simply unavailable in any other Hollywood coverage, also lending to why Behind the Star not only stands out, but is often hard to neatly peg:
When I'm sizing up stand-ins, the first thing I clock is responsibility. Are they the type to take this seriously, or are they just chasing a brush with fame? A good stand-in is quiet - not silent like a ghost, but respectful, you know? They're not yapping away or fidgeting like they've had too much espresso. I've had some who couldn't stop bouncing, and it drove the crew nuts - nervous energy's a killer on set. Then there are the talkers - bless their hearts, they think they're networking, but it's a distraction.
From the basics of being a novice aspiring actor to the practicalities of marrying a career to a life objective, Gregory's wide-ranging survey will interest a large audience whether or not they aim for Hollywood. Potential readers should ideally include those from the broader business community who will find the process of assessing self and others to be unusually raw and revealing. Perhaps this process is impossible for some, but Behind the Star gives hope to the process of showing up, doing the work right, and understanding the dynamics underlying all kinds of cooperative relationships on and off set.
Libraries seeking a blend of inspirational self-help, Hollywood insider insights, an artistic analysis of getting to "the soul of the job," and inviting business savvy paired with stark revelations, will find Behind the Star easy to highly recommend. It's for any reader looking for a passionate survey filled with specific, practical tips to navigating not just Hollywood, but life:
Write your own story, damn it. Hollywood is just a stage; life's the real blockbuster. Don't sit there waiting for Spielberg to call. Grab a pen, a camera, a hustle, and make it yours. I mean it - start tonight. Jot down what you dig. Acting? Scribble a monologue. Directing? Sketch a scene. Stand-in life? Log the chaos of your day, the wins and the flops. I kept a beatup notebook back in the day - every set, every screw-up, every "hell yeah" moment. It's my story, rough as it is, and it's why I'm still here.
The Collected Souls
Mallory Spencer
https://malloryspencer.com
Mountain Lights Press
www.mountainlightspress.com
9798998889608, $13.99 Paperback/$2.49 eBook
https://www.mountainlightspress.com/projects
In The Collected Souls, the Collector isn't just a gatherer of souls. She's also a destroyer who has harvested the souls of almost everyone in over twenty dimensions, then destroyed their universes. Only the Keeper has survived her destructive force. Tess is about to be the Collector's next victim. This places them both in a position of being powerful survivors if they can defy a universe-busting force to not just live, but recreate their futures and worlds.
Mallory Spencer's story opens on a less ethereal level as the enraged first-person protagonist strides through a crowd swearing about Hunter, her boyfriend, and his accusation of cheating before she dives into her best friend and roommate Ada's car to embark on a long drive away from everything.
Breakups, encounters with friends and parents, and ordinary life snafus don't initially seem to set the stage for a metaphysical story of magical realism and fantasy. But that's one of the allures of The Collected Souls, which thoroughly roots its characters in familiar life before embarking on a cosmic journey that is surprising and unfamiliar.
Tess's passage through a mysterious red door that pulls her away from everything she's known leads the story in a satisfyingly different direction from mundane affairs as she confronts a mysterious stranger and muses that the reality she's taken for granted may be somewhat of an illusion.
Spencer leads readers through a Narnia-like experience as Tess plots to trick the almighty Collector, becomes acquainted with many forces controlling her universe and destiny, and contemplates saving not just her life and dimension, but greater things.
Questions about her future range from world-shaping on a cosmic level to destiny-shaping on a personal level as she interacts with the Keeper, considers the forces that separated her from Hunter and define her sexuality and life ambitions, and acknowledges what the end of everything will mean.
Equally impacted by the Collector's actions and threat is the Keeper. His survival is unique but not guaranteed, and the impact of his survival and uncertain freedom comes at a cost to him, too. His perspective weaves with Tess's encounter with magic, placing them both in important positions for future survival as they grow and change.
The Keeper is tired of caring for others, only to lose them. His twenty-fifth dimension has been destroyed, he has no idea how to stop the Collector, and his struggle with whether to continue fighting or give up and die permeates further choices that place him in even more (if that's possible) challenging positions. His thoughts continually teeter between persevering and quitting:
What would it be like to fall? To simply let go...
If he's the ultimate caretaker, who will care for him?
Libraries seeking a story steeped in fantasy and thought-provoking moments of wonder will find The Collected Souls hard to peg and easy to recommend to a wide audience, from fiction and fantasy readers to those interested in stories delivered with bigger-picture thinking.
Readers who enjoy reflective plots shaped by shifting perspectives, characters who consider their pasts and future possibilities, underlying issues of suicide, social acceptance or rejection, and relationship-building challenges will find The Collected Souls thoroughly absorbing, as will book clubs interested in out-of-the-box reading.
Bruised Not Broken
Kristine B. Jensen, LCSW
www.kristine-jensen.com
On Purpose Publishing
9798990595026, $16.50 Hardcover/$12.88 Paperback/$3.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Bruised-Not-Broken-Troubled-Childhood/dp/B0DZ2PZN37
Bruised Not Broken: Healing the Shame of a Troubled Childhood is about shame, healing, and self-compassion. It is especially recommended for those who have lived through traumatic childhoods, still struggle with the past as adults, and who continue to feel broken and misunderstood from their early life experiences.
Its different method of examining the past departs from many similar-sounding approaches in that it focuses on preverbal childhood perceptions that often color adult actions, reactions, and a sense of self.
Case history examples from Kristine B. Jensen's practice offer concrete information and links between present-day anguish and these very early encounters. Each client's perceptions and adjustments to life offer a different insight into how adaptive methods of survival not only influence adult choices, but often no longer work well (if they ever did).
Lessons are wide-ranging, from learning how to genuinely accept compliments from others to cultivating forgiveness over tendencies towards revenge, and employing imagery to revise reactions to life.
These and many other approaches lend to not just better self-understanding, but alternate pathways for approaching life, others, and self.
Why put in the effort to identify the wellsprings of life reactions to make adjustments? Jensen is clear about the impacts and benefits of revising engrained survival reactions:
...false beliefs about yourself then become the unconscious template for the friends and partners you choose. For example, the pattern of always trying to win the love of the person you're dating comes from a belief that just being yourself is not enough. This mindset may also caution you not to be disagreeable and to concede in order to please them, that if you disagree or upset your partner, they will become angry and leave you. Over-focusing on how another person feels about you may also distract you from attending to how you feel about them. Identifying your beliefs puts them into your awareness and from there you can work on them. The next step is one that is often overlooked. Consider the possibility that by showing up in relationships in ways that reflect what you believe about yourself, you are sending a message that this is how you expect to be treated.
Libraries will find that this self-help guide to overcoming and virtually rewriting childhood trauma is clear, reflective, and actionable. Bruised Not Broken can be highly recommended to anyone seeking to analyze and revitalize their lives, and is filled with game plans that only require reader participation to become reality.
More so than most discourses about childhood trauma, Bruised Not Broken not only tackles issues of shame and common reactions that are ultimately self-defeating, but gently encourages those who perceive themselves as losers and broken to become winners and whole. That's worth any time spent reading these examples and following this blueprint for success, holding the potential to revise a lifetime of struggling with trauma.
Why Did God Make the Tree?
Tammy Gregg
www.tammygregg.com
Cemetery Hill Publications
https://www.cemeteryhillpublications.com
9798992327106, $28.99 Hardcover/$17.99 Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Why-Did-God-Make-Tree/dp/B0DWWZVQJR
Why Did God Make the Tree? is a Patrick Denny novel that surveys a horror novelist and psychiatrist's own small-town nightmare. Dr. Patrick Denny returns to Waylingbrooke, New Hampshire to his former profession in search of peace, routine, and the familiar milieu of helping mental patients in contrast to the horror scenes he's successfully depicted in his novels.
Instead, he confronts the fact that seemingly disparate psychiatric conditions in his mental hospital patients portend a far greater horror than he could have imagined in his fictional forays into danger.
These patient experiences edge too close to home as Patrick confronts his own past, the role of horror in his life, and the real meaning of mental conditions and their impact on reality and many things he's taken for granted in his life.
Readers may not expect an action-packed series of confrontations to evolve from the staid mental health community, but Patrick's deep dive into horror translates to an equally vivid pursuit of truth, reality, and new possibilities that creates many markedly powerful scenes:
Michael's urgent words flooded back to him - the pronouncement that had set all the events of the past month into motion: "I did it. Just like you told me to. I trapped the monster."
For a moment, Patrick stood in the silent, dark space, staring at the spotlighted door, almost too afraid to confront Michael's "it." But too much had happened and too much time wasted to hesitate any longer.
Forest rituals and contracts, the monsters in patient encounters, and relationship issues all plague Patrick's attempts to come to terms with his past, the present, and unbelievable new possibilities for his future.
Tammy Gregg creates a number of characters adjacent to Patrick whose interests and pursuits dovetail neatly with the good doctor's growing tension over his life, choices, and future. These range from Michael, who wields Patrick's book like a bible and follows its horror into real-world darkness, to Helen, a former agent-turned-girlfriend who knows when it's time for him to consider a restraining order.
Gregg juxtaposes these disparate lives with the horror that rises to embrace each of them, crafting a powerful interplay of character perceptions and interests which enhances the haunting overlay of psychological struggle that lies under the cloak of horror.
Libraries interested in literary stories of psychological confrontation, horror, and relationship-buffeting impossible circumstances will find Why Did God Make the Tree? replete with the unexpected. It's highly recommendable to genre readers who look for thought-provoking moments from their novels.
Filled with otherworldly encounters delivered with engaging conundrums for added value, Why Did God Make the Tree? is a delightfully unpredictable foray into psychological horror that is thoroughly absorbing from start to finish.
Broadcast Live
Steve Vogel
www.stevevogelauthor.com
Independently Published
9798317806880, $34.49 Hardcover/$8.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Broadcast-Live-stories-including-forget/dp/B0FH63ZYQZ
Broadcast Live: 71 True Stories, Including Some I'd Just as Soon Forget comes from a veteran broadcast industry participant who here records his experiences, memories, and stories of his life inside and outside of radio broadcasting. His effort creates a vivid memoir that moves from Steve Vogel's first Washington news conference in the 1960s to life experiences as diverse as a donkey called Xavier.
He also explores the early beginnings of what was to be a broadcast career when, at age 10, his father invested in a radio transmitter that led Vogel to turn his bedroom into a broadcast studio.
Readers receive more than an adult's foray through the political worlds of broadcasting and radio show production. This sojourn through life captures the nuances of Vogel's influences as well as his career, providing a multifaceted backdrop for better understanding the engagements, impact, and meaning of his broadcast work.
Vogel outlines colorful characters, major broadcasting achievements, minor snafus, and shifting social conditions surrounding broadcast choices. One example is the conflict between rock 'n roll and a Christian minister who claimed the music to be the work of the devil. What better attraction than to invite Paul Kantner and Rev. Wesley Ates to an on-air debate? Their discourse includes lively details that will delight readers who were not there, but can now vicariously live those times and issues.
Later encounters include those with Larry King, Vogel's return to the newspaper world, and interactions with personalities whose motivations and impacts spring to life via vivid, entertaining descriptions.
Students of broadcast history and American culture will find Broadcast Live especially delightful for its foray into bygone times and the "mystic moments" of music, culture, radio and entertainment, and news creation and reporting.
The wide-ranging scope of this memoir will bring it to the attention of general-interest audiences outside the broadcasting and media communities, promising a read that is thought-provoking, sometimes hilarious, and ultimately a heartfelt exploration of a journalist's world via his chronicle of moving through life.
Libraries will want to acquire and recommend Broadcast Live not just to media studies or American history readers, but for general-interest memoir audiences who will especially appreciate its vivid re-creation of bygone eras, personalities, and perspectives.
The Courage to Begin Again
Kirsten Harty, Compiler
Halo Publishing International
https://halopublishing.com
9781637657553, $23.95 Hardcover/$14.95 Paperback/$6.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Courage-Begin-Again-Resilience-Reinvention/dp/1637657978
The Courage to Begin Again: Stories of Resilience, Courage, and Reinvention chronicles how ten selected women left their lives behind to start anew in Mexico, moving to an alien world that demanded they restart their futures without the familiar support systems and angst of home.
Their diverse experiences embrace the process of moving from chaos to meaning and lives filled with new opportunities, detailing the particular challenges involved in leaving everything (and everyone) behind to move to a new country.
These stories are filled with hope as well as experience and psychological depth. They embrace the process of risk-taking and reinventing one's world, capturing both in passionate, purposeful writing which brings readers into the choices, obstacles, and opportunities involved.
One example of such powerful writing lies in Patricia Pulido's 'New City, New Me: Finding Home Again':
I couldn't believe it - I was the one falling apart, not my kids. I walked away feeling disappointed and unwelcome, the weight of her reaction lingering long after. With no one to share my frustrations, apart from my ever-supportive husband, the moment felt even heavier. I knew I needed comfort, but I also realized that some things would be different this time. I couldn't let myself fall into the trap of constant comparisons.
Each woman bares her soul while candidly assessing obstacles to her new life and how she was forced to adopt new survival techniques that ultimately led to better pathways for responding to life as a whole.
Individually, the stories chronicle what's involved in honing the courage to begin again; but the proof of this anthology's success lies in its collective force.
As Camila Ifanger points out in her fine story 'From Inner Chaos to Purpose':
Starting over is not a weakness but rather the greatest act of self-love.
Anyone experiencing a change that involved moving to a different country and environment will want to acquire and read these experiences. They detail a growth process that goes far beyond the usual cross-cultural encounters and challenges, delving into the psychic adjustments and transformative life values that translate to true reinvention.
Libraries choosing The Courage to Begin Again for their collections will thus wish to highly recommend it not just to patrons facing big moves, but to those seeking insights about connections between environmental change and psychological growth.
Book clubs and reading groups will also find The Courage to Begin Again of special interest for its diverse and uplifting contrasts between hope, achievement, and perspective.
Sunshine on the Crooked Road
Ndirangu Githaiga
https://www.ndirangugithaiga.com
Bon Esprit Books
9781735041797, $14.99 Paperback/$5.99 eBook
https://www.ndirangugithaiga.com/books/sunshine-on-the-crooked-road
After six years living away from their native Kenya, Wanjiku and Kabogo return home to a country simmering in transformation and opportunity in Sunshine on the Crooked Road. Their homecoming after having lived in a world which blends cultures and language not only pulls them away from friends they'd come to consider as family, but brings to the surface marital and social discord. Old conflicts come to life and, it turns out, new promises can't be trusted.
As life in 70s and 80s Kenya unfolds, husband and wife find their lives and worlds physically and mentally divided, and are forced to find new ways to relate to their much-altered home and their conjoined lives.
Ndirangu Githaiga provides a spirited, realistic survey of daily life undergoing sea changes as the couple adjusts to their revised world, considers what they've left behind or sacrificed in the effort, and how to deal with the personality changes that have widened the rift between them:
Wanjiku enjoyed evenings like this, all too rare, when Kabogo seemed at least moderately friendly. Usually, he came home in a foul mood or simply not interested in engaging with her. She never knew which Kabogo would come through the door.
From circumstances of business networking which further prompt Kabogo to choose work over intimacy to Wanjiku's own involvement outside the home to fill in too many gaps in her life, Githaiga creates, via dialogue and character encounters, a realistic world in which new ventures challenge old mindsets and assumptions.
Each of the characters grows as a result of their choices to adjust to this strange yet familiar new world. Each embarks on new quests to reinvent their friendships, connections, and lives.
Especially notable are the small and large pivot points of change which each individual faces during the course of these daily obstacles and decisions:
Wanjiku tried hard to hide her frustration, recognizing that she had withheld important information from him and that he had probably done the best he could with what she had told him. It was only nine in the morning when she left the office. Exasperated, she found herself walking toward Ronald Ngala Street to do something she would have considered unthinkable even just an hour earlier.
Even more pointed and thought-provoking are passages in which interactions prove baffling, are filled with social and political reflections about changing times, and which provoke a better understanding of Kenyan peoples in readers who may come to Sunshine on the Crooked Road with little prior knowledge of the nation's culture.
Libraries seeking African literature and cultural fiction which holds the power to introduce nuances of the changing continent and its peoples will want to welcome Sunshine on the Crooked Road into their collections.
Replete with life-altering influences, moments, and social reflections, Sunshine on the Crooked Road is easy to absorb, thought-provoking, and highly recommendable to book clubs and readers learning more about African lives in general and Kenyan transformation in particular.
Privilege (Peaceful Society Book 1)
Megan Wobus
https://www.meganbeller.com
Peaceful Society Books
9798999267603, $9.99 paperback, $2.99 eBook
https://www.meganbeller.com/the-peaceful-society
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FDG7LPHW
Privilege is the first book in the Peaceful Society series set in the near-future of 2034, when women have taken over Greater Maryland and weapons are banned all over the world in the name of peace.
In order for there to be peace, there must be peacekeepers. Amity is ready to take her Oath to become one of them, but her newfound commitment and duties drive her far from home into unexpected territory, where she confronts hard truths about everything she's been taught and has come to believe as true.
Megan Wobus employs the first person like an ax of realization, bringing readers into this world's thoughts and perceptions in manner that reveals different levels of compliance, understanding, and a slow realization about the underlying costs of privilege and duty:
I remember when I got my first SafeGuard, the pride and happiness on my mom's face. Phones were confiscated along with weapons, but the SafeGuard would let her know where I was and let her communicate with me. It would help her keep me safe at all times.
From a father's plot to retake what he believes he rightfully owns to Vale's mother's loss, the great impact of peace on his family, and his attraction to Amity, the characters on all sides of this supercharged political equation and the divide between men and women come to life:
My upbringing, once we left Baltimore, was big on training and fighting. I've still got scars from what I went through with him. Send Vale to train, get the doctor to fix Vale up. Rinse and repeat. I should forget about Amity along with everything else in this evil city. I'm sure she stood there and took her Oath, ready to go deeper into the sick web of women exacting their revenge on a world they hate and a reality they refuse to accept.
Of special note is Amity and Vale's unexpected reconnection on a new level despite the social forces that create a rift between them. Wobus cements these new insights with dialogues and encounters that merge past experience with present-day opportunity in unexpected ways and places:
When he was a kid he was hard to play with. One of those kids who doesn't always relate. A little too wellspoken, his humor a little too dry to fit in.
I shake my head. "You haven't changed much, have you?"
His eyes are warm. "You've changed a lot."
I narrow my eyes, waiting for a leer, but his gaze is hot and glued to my face. I catch my breath.
As the connection between them plays out, the idealism and reality of Peaceful Society that has divided them is set aside for bigger questions and new perceptions.
This, in turn, leads readers into thought-provoking territory about all kinds of subjects ranging from male/female differences, interactions, and choices to the impact of privileged thinking and idealism in a society supposedly rebuilt on ideals of peace, but which enforces repression to do so.
Libraries interested in YA dystopian romances, adults interested in bigger-picture thinking about social experiments and idealism, and book clubs looking for thoroughly engrossing material about relationship-building on different levels will all find Privilege a winner.
Though it's billed as a young adult read with young characters and emergent situations, Privilege should not be neglected by adults looking for exceptionally thought-provoking reads about women's issues, men's roles, and the sacrifices possible in pursuit of a truly peaceful society.
God's Day Off
Larry Brill
www.larrybrill.com
Black Tie Books
9780996083478, $17.99
On the seventh day, God rested from his creation work. But when he did, what if he placed atheist Adam in charge for the day? And what happens when Adam locks himself out of the Command Center, forcing him to undertake a journey across the universe for the key to re-enter heaven before the fledgling world destroys itself under his watch?
These are just some of the satirical facets that power God's Day Off, a wry examination certain to offend devoted Christians as much as it will delight those who appreciate the finer art of intersecting satirical religious inspection with fantasy.
The saga begins with a cheery letter from God, delivered straight from the pearly gates:
Hello!
Hello, and welcome to Heaven. I'm glad you could make it. This is your orientation course: Life in the Afterlife 101.
I am your God.
Oh, yes. Some of you may know me as Yahweh. Or Allah. Or Buddha, Father, or even Zeus. Whichever flavor you bake into your spiritual cookie, each is sweet in its own way.
The primer neatly introduces the kind of God who cultivates humor even as he seeks to educate the masses on the Parable of Adam and what really happened on that seventh day of His rest (or unrest, as the case might be).
This segues into a scenario in which card-carrying atheist Adam has discovered that heaven is all too real, making him face a post-life conundrum. God only knows what he'll do. And, God does know.
The reflective exchanges between Adam and God power a story replete with examinations of faith, irony, and a journey that changes Adam's world.
Larry Brill's descriptions injects this story with fun humor present in such visuals as "Adam is getting his atheist hackles up" and such scenarios as a God who prefers not to be interrupted on his one day off from work:
She is as dry as the dust in Adam's hair and on his feet. "Uhm. We were wondering if The Big Guy is around. Is he in?"
She shakes her head. "No. It's his day off. Haven't you heard?"
Libraries seeking religious satire and irony woven into a story that is exciting, unpredictable, filled with fun, and surprising in its thought-provoking dilemmas will want to add God's Day Off into their collections as an outstanding example of the power of satirical examination ... especially if they are unafraid of offending their Christian audiences.
Replete with humor and reflections that develop into high adventure, God's Day Off is creative, original, and just plain fun:
I am not vengeful and I will smite any of you who believe I am. (just kidding).
Big Blue
Douglas P. Peiffer
Independently Published
9798218612627, $14.99 Paperback/$4.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Big-Blue-Parable-Modern-Day-Migration/dp/B0F218P54P
Big Blue chronicles the journey of Bill Blythe and his teen daughter Jocelyn, who undertake a journey to Mexico in search of a rare medical device for his daughter's heart condition that is unlikely to be found in the chaotic U.S. medical system.
Their involvement with a Mexican family whose sister has become the focus of unwanted attention from Bill's rival Ed, who wants to sacrifice her to avoid a federal raid on his farm, becomes more convoluted as the story unfolds. Relationships, associations, and motivations are independently involved in the outcome not just of Jocelyn's health, but migrant issues as a whole.
It sounds like a lot to dovetail a personal quest for health into broader social and political conflict, but Douglas P. Peiffer wields these disparate lives and their influences and special interests with a deft attention to making the story involving, realistic, and thought-provoking.
He creates exceptional characters whose lives and concerns entwine with bigger-picture thinking, crafts dialogues between them and contrasts between different cultures that bring all these issues to light on a personal level, and makes them not just believable, but compelling, creating a story that could be rooted in today's shifting American climate.
All these facets contribute to a powerful migration story that introduces unexpected twists as Bill, Jocelyn, Ed, and a host of Mexican immigrants and nationals find their lives entwined in unexpected ways that introduce issues of vengeance and survival.
Injected into these fictional quandaries are real-world reflections on migrants, jobs, and changing attitudes towards their work and contributions:
"Remember the A-Team," Ed's uncle warned him every time a younger, more inexperienced Ed argued that American workers could do a better job picking melons than migrants. "It happened once, and it'll happen again." Ed's uncle was referring to a group of teenagers - all white, all male, all overprivileged - who in the summer of '65 heeded their government's call to solve what was viewed as a Mexican migrant labor problem. Labeled the A-Team, the group of highschoolers who boarded buses headed to Blythe to pick melons that summer bought into the narrative that anything Mexicans could do, they could do better. Little did they realize that harvesting melons in the stifling heat of a California cantaloupe field for ten, twelve, sometimes sixteen hours a day required more than empty boasts and custom straw hats. It was hard, hot, backbreaking work for low pay and with little downtime. It was the type of work that required a tireless resolve that their sheltered backgrounds could never create. Suffice it to say, it was only a matter of weeks before the busloads of boastful American teens returned home, and the program was ended.
Libraries seeking a contemporary novel of immigration fiction that juxtaposes the perceptions and experiences of Mexicans and Americans approaching the border from vastly different directions will appreciate how richly Big Blue contrasts these worlds.
Readers looking for immigrant experience presented in a very different style than the unusual singular focus on immigration will appreciate how vividly and realistically Big Blue outlines its conundrums and reviews solutions to seemingly impossible situations.
Rich in its depictions of special interests, bullying, safety, and political inspections, Big Blue is a winner.
Consequence of Power: Isabella's Seasons
Sabrina Lund
www.sabrinalundauthor.com
Goose House Publishing
9781068787928, $15.99 Paperback/$2.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Consequence-Power-Isabellas-Sabrina-Lund/dp/1068787929
Consequence of Power: Isabella's Seasons opens in 1763 London, where young Isabella Thornbury steps into society to make her mark, only to uncover threads of deception and treachery as love and betrayal make their marks on her life and perspective.
From the start Sabrina Lund constructs a double-edged sword of privilege and discovery, wielding it with a mighty descriptive voice that compels readers to step out of their times and into Isabella's world:
Across the river, I observe the figures under the cover of darkness, each within their gondolas, progressing as though on a silent pilgrimage, closer and closer. Upon each arrival, they assume their milk-white robes with enveloping hoods that darken their faces further than the night, and drink deeply of a rich liquid. At the toll of the bell, they float ghostly and slowly across the lawn... From my imagination, I have created this. From seeds I nurtured, planned, designed this paradise and it is more exhilarating to see it in its physicality than I ever dreamed. They know not what lies before them, but I, the architect, am omniscient and possess all knowledge, for I repeat: I created this.
This creates an intoxicating, atmospheric sense of mystery and discovery from the story's outset as history, mystery, and romantic appeal coalesce in a tale that brings readers right into 1700s London society with all of its follies and rules.
Lund's ability to craft an immersive story is evident in scenes that cement Isabella's observations of polite society with the undercurrents of scandal and delight that permeate walls of respectability:
The words "I am amazed, and know not what to say!" flew into Isabella's romantic mind - she could not restrain herself. With satisfaction, she glanced back into the looking-glass. Indeed, it seemed as though her dreams were materialising in a manner most divine.
From the organization and efforts of household staff to improprieties, secret unions, treacherous crossings, and Isabella's unexpected journeys, Consequence of Power is thoroughly steeped in history and mystery. They come alive to draw readers into the puzzles, delights, and conundrums of these times.
Libraries seeking historical blends of mystery and romance which are especially atmospheric and compelling in their delivery will want to make Consequence of Power a "must have" addition to their collections.
Readers of Regency romances, historical fiction that considers social and political struggles, and absorbing scenes of 18th century passions and processes will relish how Isabella navigates her world with authority, critical inspection, and a savvy eye to personal and social survival.
Replete with strong undercurrents of gothic intrigue and notes of delightful discoveries, Consequence of Power is well-developed, unpredictable, and hard to put down.
Do Not Resuscitate
Scott Eveloff MD
www.scotteveloff.com
Black Rose Writing
www.blackrosewriting.com
9781685136635, $21.95
https://www.blackrosewriting.com/thrillers/p/donotresuscitate
What happens when the supernatural world edges into thriller territory? Do Not Resuscitate is what emerges. It's a production designed to captivate with intrigue, engage with suspense, and delight with unpredictable force as medical intern Harry Lindmark falls under suspicion for not just one death under his watch, but a series of unexplained demises.
Things become personal with the death of his infant son as Harry struggles to discern what is going on, only to fall into apparently nefarious supernatural influences which shouldn't be happening - but are.
Even the book's descriptive subtitle ("Hospital Evil - Where No One Can Hear You Scream") is a draw. The first-person story examines DNR issues and demands, seemingly accidental but suspicious death scenarios, and tense reconsiderations of how closely the fine line between life and death can align:
Launched from medical school naivete into internship, I'd barely been prepared for all the disease and death that nature caused. But no amount of lectures or hands-on education could have prepared me for the horrors beyond death. There was nothing natural about that hospital. Or probably for any hospital that housed so much disease and dying. Who could I go to for help? What textbook could I read for the right guideline? Who was next? The thoughts terrified me.
Readers interested in medical thrillers that sizzle with the added value of supernatural intrigue will find Do Not Resuscitate nicely blends an investigative tone with bigger-picture thinking about moral and ethical life conundrums.
Its use of the first person brings readers directly into Harry's Harry's perspectives and evolving personal and professional conundrums. The strange events endangering his patients and those he cares about test not only his problem-solving skills, but his ability to define his life's path and validate his value.
As each piece of a greater puzzle falls into place, readers will find the realistic concerns, medical scenarios, and supernatural impacts a fine formula for unpredictable, engrossing mystery reading.
Libraries that delve into Do Not Resuscitate will want to recommend it to a wide audience of mystery readers, supernatural fiction followers, and reading groups seeking immersive experiences.
Replete with finely-tuned tension and personal reflection, Do Not Resuscitate is a powerful story that injects observations that are thoroughly compelling; lingering in the mind long after the mystery is resolved.
The Exquisite Feast
Jenelle Harden
Independently Published
9798280934504, $18.99 Hardcover/$12.99 Paperback
https://www.amazon.com/Exquisite-Feast-Jenelle-Harden-LCSW/dp/B0F6M9JYRD
The Exquisite Feast reaches picture book readers with the gentle story of a Lake Michigan raccoon family whose mealtimes always seem fraught with accusation and resistance from those who don't appreciate their nighttime foraging.
Elise and her raccoon siblings hold very different attitudes about locating food. Elsie is more daring but is often too reckless; Ali plans for everything to the point that too often she's afraid to take action; and Ren's big ideas usually aren't even part of the food focus.
How can such very different siblings achieve their goals of exquisite eating when they have basic trouble getting along?
A wise grandmother tells them a story that outlines possible paths for resolution.
Marie Del's vivid, colorful drawings of the raccoon family add attention and interest to Jenelle Harden's inviting tale of differences and adaptation.
Libraries and read-aloud parents seeking engaging stories about cooperative ventures and thinking will welcome The Exquisite Feast's invitation to rethink patterns of engagement and relationships. These can translate to meaningful dialogues with young listeners.
Filled with perspectives about what unique qualities make every individual special and worthy of respect, The Exquisite Feast offers many thought-provoking moments in its charming story of getting along, building strengths, goal-setting, and more as Elise comes to realize the value of different approaches to life:
She splashed some cool water on her face. When she saw her reflection again, she felt love for herself for the first time. She thought about how she and her siblings were so different, but had unique qualities that made each of them special.
Strange Shape of Love
Herta Feely
Castle Bridge Media
https://www.castlebridgemedia.com
9798991785563, $4.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Strange-Shape-Love-Herta-Feely-ebook/dp/B0F8VBSDZD
Strange Shape of Love is a crime story about blackmail that rises to the surface when would-be reporter Charlotte Cooper is threatened with the online publication of five nude photos unless she acquiesces to demands. They've approached the wrong woman, because as tenacious as Charlotte is about her career aspirations, she's equally stubborn when it comes to bowing to pressure.
She undertakes an investigation of who sent the nudes, delving into a world of sex trafficking, trauma, intrigue, and dangerous revelations. These draw her ever deeper into her own past and its connections to a dubious future.
Readers may not expect romance to emerge from such murky and mysterious milieus, but Herta Feely masterfully weaves this into Charlotte's story. This edges her into the lives of Rafe and Zander even though she is taking a break from love to pursue other interests, such as pursuing the owner of the photos.
Her search brings her to Paris to confront her former lover, to the realization that her pursuit is introducing dangerous forces into Rafe's life, and to the possibility that she'll lose close friendships and jobs and still not be on the winning wide of discovery and recovery.
Feely injects startling confrontations and scenes into her story as tangled webs of possibility emerge:
Contrary to Rafe's opinion, she was certain Naomi was stalking her. Them.
She builds excellent tension from complicated relationships which then are discarded as bigger-picture thinking emerges. Readers interested in an exploratory sojourn into past and present life challenges will especially appreciate how Charlotte navigates the collision of those two worlds.
Libraries seeking an investigative drama that will attract women interested in stories packed with well-buried secrets and skeletons that emerge from relationship quandaries will find Strange Shape of Love a vivid story. It's easily recommendable to a wide audience.
Meticulous in its characterization, intrigue, and blend of romance and heart-stopping realizations, Strange Shape of Love holds the power to appeal to romance and mystery audiences alike, offering a different blend of both which is satisfyingly realistic and thought-provoking.
Fix the Fire Damage: Your Go-To Guide When Pain First Strikes
Ya-Ling J. Liou
Return to Health Press
9780991309429, $65.95 Paperback/$29.95 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0991309421
Book 2 in The Everyday Pain Guide series, Fix the Fire Damage: Your Go-To Guide When Pain First Strikes, will appeal to self-help readers intent on stocking a home library with go-to books filled with actionable plans for tackling all kinds of pain and healing challenges.
More than the usual general admonition about pain sources and exercises, Fix the Fire Damage packs its pages with insights about first responses when pain initially strikes.
Chapters cover everything from body mechanics and chemistry to specific daily adjustments of exercise, habit, and movement. These move from sleep positions to exercise repetitions designed to not just strengthen the body, but reduce pain.
Black and white photos marked with arrows reinforce positions and approaches to such basics as bodily weight distribution during movement, isometric activation, and rebuilding muscular support when a back, arm, leg, or other body part is tweaked and radiating pain.
Accompanying these chapters of exercises and exceptionally clear visual examples are later discussions about nutrition and supplementation. At every juncture in the body assessment and rejuvenation process, Ya-Ling J. Liou provides specific, research-supported insights that elevate Fix the Fire Damage above the usual how-to recovery guide.
No prior medical knowledge is needed to absorb these routines and insights. Footnoted references to such topics as the importance of magnesium and how its lack often translates to increased muscle and nervous tension makes the information widely accessible to general-interest audiences.
Libraries seeking a book that is weighty and comprehensive in appearance and approach, but surprisingly accessible and clear in its step-by-step guide to managing pain of all kinds, should consider the higher price tag of Fix the Fire Damage an indicator of its importance.
Filled with well-researched, specific routines for reducing pain and better understanding its origins and impact, Fix the Fire Damage is an assessment and action plan for pain management that comes from an evidence-based chiropractic physician's eye for reducing and eliminating suffering. It belongs on the shelves of home health libraries and general-interest library collections alike.
Waiting for Something Else
Martin Cloutier
Heliotrope Books
www.heliotropebooks.com
9781956474626, $20.00 Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F4Y77MTQ
Waiting for Something Else is a novel about love - but it's not the usual approach to either straight attraction or gay affection. It lies somewhere in-between as more of a 'bromance with sex,' with a woman adding complexity to the exploration.
The urban pioneers described in the prologue open the events in 2006 Brooklyn, describing the area's gentrification while setting the stage for Martin Cloutier's story. It incorporates a particularly wry tone of inspection that is delightfully ironic in its contrasts:
If they came from Manhattan, they came with expectations. And sometimes the small restaurant with its plain brick facade couldn't fulfill them. There was no coat check, no elongated bar or sexy mixologist, no giant statues, water walls, or crystal chandeliers. Just a frosted glass door with a cursive B. People often walked right by without noticing. Then they would call, irate, and claim they'd been given bad directions.
Restaurants, meeting places, and changing physical backdrops to life form a fine cultural foundation for the social and personal inspections that evolves in this romantic comedy about New Yorkers searching for connection.
Within the spotlight are women, wine, men, and observers of and participants in the gay community. Cloutier presents intriguing dialogues and insights to bring disparate viewpoints to life, creating perspectives that are both realistic and thought-provoking:
"They're horrible people. How do you stand them?" He continued on as if he knew the answer. As if Roger was a horrible person too. And maybe he was. Maybe gay men were characteristically sex-crazed and superficial, obsessed with body parts and beauty, afraid of intimacy and apple pie. Maybe all they could do was snipe and bolster their fragile egos, while scoping out the latest sexual conquest to eradicate their feelings of inadequacy. This was a critique as old as Larry Kramer, and one he had some sympathy with. He could understand how an outsider might regard their quips and banter as Lord of the Flies behavior - where only the wittiest and most beautiful survived. But he didn't know how to justify it to James. How to explain the hurt behind the humor. How to separate what was harmful from what was playful.
The story unfolds like a mixologist's dream, continually adding ingredients that seem predicable, than shaking them up to create surprises of connection and insight that will leave readers both laughing and thinking.
It's unusual to enjoy this constant contrast in a novel about love; but Cloutier crafts a disparate circle of realistic characters. These range from organizational genius James, a newcomer whose world is defined by twenty-six years of Buddhism and an attention to detail, to Roger, who is aware of manager James's limitations, but is experiencing an existential crisis of his own. Also lively is Sherry, an "older woman" five years his senior whose live-in boyfriend Sean doesn't limit new possibilities in the relationship department.
As these characters take deep dives into dating and transformation, the story becomes a ribald juxtaposition of restaurant world and collective connections as new avenues are explored and life revelations emerge.
Libraries seeking a novel about New York culture, gay and straight life, friendships and love, and wry examinations of life will find Waiting for Something Else holds all this and more. It speaks to future generations with a carefully crafted, reflective voice that brings these worlds and young people to life.
The play and acting that consumes the characters as much as food holds a descriptor that can apply to the overall theme of the novel itself:
"So, Roger," Barbara leaned across the table. "Tell us what your play's about."
"It's about the limits we place on ourselves. In love. Sex. Relationships." He stole a glance at James. "Whether through society or biology."
Its foray into all these topics makes Waiting for Something Else realistic, funny, unpredictable, and filled with food for thought that book clubs, too, will heartily appreciate.
Ines: The Queens of Portugal Trilogy
Catherine Mathis
www.catherinemathis.com
Histria Books
www.histriabooks.com
9781592116027, $19.99 PB, $9.99 Kindle, 360pp
https://www.amazon.com/In%C3%AAs-Portugal-Trilogy-Catherine-Mathis/dp/1592116027
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/ines-catherine-mathis/1146736420
Ines: The Queens of Portugal Trilogy opens in 1361 on Lent, where angry King Pedro confronts an abbot who has the gall to suggest that he might murder his own son to favor the boys of his newly crowned Lady Ines. The abbot is only reflecting rumors in the kingdom. These also have shaken young Ferdinand, who demands to know his father's succession plans.
Pedro explains what should be obvious - that, due to Ferdinand's sickly nature, it's only logical that the Lady's sons João and Dinis should be recognized as his successors should he die, thus preventing an outbreak of civil war. It's clear what motivates him:
Twined purposes drove Pedro - fulfilling an oath born of his love for Ines whilst securing their sons' right to the throne.
But Ferdinand doesn't see things that way.
And so begins a different kind of war, in which Portugal's security, lineage, and political safety supersede matters of loyalty, love, and personal happiness.
Readers might anticipate, from the book's title, that a prior deep knowledge of Portuguese and European history is a requirement in order to enjoy this historical survey. While such background certainly helps understand the novel's backdrop and progression of events, in actuality, readers need not be quasi-historians in order to learn from and appreciate the dilemmas that evolve when love and politics clash.
Political interests and influences which come between not only father and son, but couples, entwine with medieval historical precedent to create a love story of doomed individuals. This reads like a Romeo and Juliet dilemma, albeit with intercontinental conflicts introduced by threats from the Moors, the merits of marital alliances which will serve Portugal more than participating in unions, and the experiences of women who live in convents:
She knew now it was possible to be suffocated and yet breathe. Ines was lost in a thick fog in which each day was much like the one before it. Her daily thanks to God for weather, seasons, and His saints set the tone for the monotony of her existence. The abbess spared her Nocturns and Matins until the day she professed the religious life. The Prime bell each morning called her to waken and to come to church. Her day consisted of reading the Bible, sewing convent linens or consignments for rich women living in the world, or taking a walk over the grounds.
The life and breadth of options for men and women from royalty to commoner are contrasted through circumstances that immerse them in choices not of their own. These approaches are reflective of the struggles of Portugal to assume its place in the world (and find and rely on its strong leadership) in shifting Medieval times.
Even more notable is the way in which Catherine Mathis intersects these lives and special interests with the lives of young Pedro and others who are raised to know (and sometimes defy) their progressive future in Portugal's leadership.
Pedro's friendship with the Castilians introduces conflicts and nuances of choice that threaten not only the status quo, but the future of his country. His unique choices and pursuits not only create different pathways for the future, but challenge succession rules with new possibilities:
...they thought him mad to crown her. They obeyed because they must. He swallowed the worry that these men would fail to back his heirs when the time came.
The blend of history and personal motivations is finely wrought, bringing readers into the emotional and political milieu of characters who find their friendships and associations contribute either uncertainty or strength not just within Portugal, but its status and relationships with other nations.
Libraries seeking a historical novel rooted in Medieval European times, yet just as firmly enhanced with psychological and political understanding, will find Ines: The Queens of Portugal Trilogy an excellent depiction of the times, the people, and characters whose lives and concerns are realistic and engrossing.
Readers (especially those with some background in either Portuguese or Medieval European history) will find the story replete with dilemmas, twists, and decision-making conundrums that bring these times and their hopes, dreams, and questions of legitimacy and possibility to life.
Mathis creates a universally-accessible story of family communication issues, rejection, and love against all odds. These elements, combined with astute inspections of historical detail, make the plot thoroughly engrossing and deeply educational for all.
Know: Where the Status Quo Ends and You Come to Life
Amy Cerny Vasterling
https://amyvasterling.com
River Grove Books
c/o Greenleaf Book Group
https://greenleafbookgroup.com
9781966629146, $16.95 Paperback/$19.95 Hardcover/ $14.95 Audio/$8.99 ebook
https://www.amazon.com/Know-Where-Status-Ends-Come/dp/1966629141
Know: Where the Status Quo Ends and You Come to Life embraces Amy Cerny Vasterling's introductory reflection that:
The cause of my distress was a lifetime of trying to suppress, and let's be honest, shut off and out that voice inside me - the one that held wisdom unique to me, the one that held my power and could direct me to a life where I would be fully me, the voice I would come to call my "personal knowing." By ignoring this voice - this personal knowing - I was all but ensuring I fell into a life that satisfied what others expected of me, not a life I wanted for myself, not the life I was born to live, not a life I found satisfying. The result was my nearly constant discomfort.
The broader impact of ignoring one's innate desires and perceptions in favor of cultural and social messages is more than personal dissatisfaction, but indicates a life not well lived.
Know explores how to listen, cultivate, and learn from this inner voice. It teaches the foundations of self-knowledge and trust, translating that knowledge into bigger-picture thinking about its powerful impact:
As you work toward increasing your trust in your knowing, expect the process to feel challenging, abstract, lonely, and at points, weird. You might find yourself on a plateau now and then, knowing the direction you are meant to go but unable to push the boundaries of The Model further. You might rest there awhile. But once you start down this road (and by the way, reading this book says you've already started), you won't be able to turn back. This alone affirms you came born for the future.
Chapters unfold a blend of method and example which juxtapose case histories with insights readers can easily absorb.
Vasterling explores the impact of such an approach to life, considering how best to listen and reflect this inner voice with an eye to revealing its ultimate results:
...connection to our knowing leads us to self-love. Understanding ourselves and our purpose free of fear moves us into self-expression. The ultimate gain is we move out of the "spiritual" and into a new perception about ourselves as the creator.
The message that "personal knowing works" will appeal to libraries seeking self-help titles rich in psychological inspection and process. It also will appeal to those who may have wondered about their innate dissatisfaction with status quo and life, but have been clueless as to how to take the next steps.
Filled with game plans reinforced by example, Know: Where the Status Quo Ends and You Come to Life emphasizes self-empowerment and positivity for the future that translates to deeper knowing, actionable change, and self-trust that results in thriving, not just surviving.
Its promise should reach both individuals involved in self-examination and reading groups interested in discussions which fuel self-analysis and reconsiderations of the future.
The Sylvan Hotel
Frannie James
Hinton Publishing
c/o Vertvolta Press
https://www.vertvoltapress.com
9781609441654, $20.99 Paperback/$6.99 eBook
https://www.vertvoltapress.com/work/the-sylvan-hotel-a-novel-by-frannie-james
The Sylvan Hotel takes place in Seattle, where a venerable old hotel becomes the focal point for secrets and stars who want to keep them hidden. Receptionist Joann doesn't view her hotel job as anything more than a resting point. She's trying to figure out how to hone a new career, but the hotel and its workers draw her into its world.
There's a co-worker who may (or may not) be a romantic possibility; residents whose lives intersect not just in passing in the lobby but in other ways, and the matter of her own heart, which she is still learning to decipher, in pursuit of a better future.
Against this personal perspective the hotel job comes alive with new possibilities, challenges, and relationships that lead Joann to forge new paths in more ways than just a secretary's chair marking time on a carpet.
Readers won't expect the moral and ethical situations which arise in the course of her workday, but Joann's queries to her customers and coworkers reflect the kinds of approaches to life that she needs to understand if she's ever to make a life for herself:
She triple- and quadrupled-checked the matchbox lettering. Would he be friendly? Snooty? How often would they be staying at the Sylvan? Could she really "network" on the job? What was appropriate? Would she even have a chance to talk to any of them?
As she becomes caught in the middle of unexpected conundrums, Joann forges a new identity out of crisis that leads her to understand not only her choices, but her compulsions:
The problem was, she could no longer see herself without him. It was like she was breathing through him. Hell, she was breathing through all of them.
Frannie James employs Joann's vivid reflections to bring to life not just one person's ambitions and issues, but the entire milieu of a hotel "family" in all its strengths and weaknesses.
Her approach cements the notion of microcosms of community and growth, lending to much thought-provoking reading while building the case for a good book club assignment attractive for its multifaceted relationship focus.
Libraries that choose The Sylvan Hotel for its Seattle-centric locale, its promise of growth and revelation, or its sense of youthful optimism and nostalgia will find the intersection of all these facets creates attraction for many different patrons, from readers of women's fiction to those who appreciate stories steeped in discovery and journeys both physical and mental.
Replete with powerful relationship-building opportunities and world-building features, The Sylvan Hotel is a delight to absorb. It is highly recommended reading for audiences seeking stories of attraction and change.
Simi's Favorite Shoes
Lilly Anne Wolfson
Independently Published
9798316221738, $14.99, $5.99 Kindle, 28pp (Ages 3-6)
https://www.amazon.com/Simis-Favorite-Shoes-Tale-Feet/dp/B0FDL21JXP
Simi's Favorite Shoes: A Tale of Two Feet offers adults a read-aloud rhyming picture book about a young girl enthusiastically dressing for another fun day. At the bottom of the stairs awaits a lineup of shoes that all eagerly wait to participate in the fun, too. There's only one problem: she only has two feet!
Simi explores the positive nature of Crocs, sandals, running shoes, and winter boots - all of which have names and sport whimsical faces whether or not they have laces.
As Simi explores which shoes are best suited for each adventure, she celebrates their attributes and applications in a way the very young can appreciate and learn from.
Packed with colorful flights of the imagination, Simi's Favorite Shoes is an uplifting adventurous tale that adults will have just as much fun with as the youngsters they're reading to.
Further value stems from the bonus interactive materials to be found at the end of the book. Added educational value is provided as young Simi confronts the dilemma of having to choose just the right shoe for her plans, with a special message about efforts supporting her realization that "You cannot guess everything right."
However, you can correctly guess that Simi's Favorite Shoes will be wonderfully appealing.
Wonder and Joy for the Wired and Tired
Pam Stephens Lehenbauer, PhD, MBA, MSN, APRN-BC
Bear Paw Press
9798992526806, $15.99 Paperback/$7.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Wonder-Joy-Wired-Tired-Wonder-Filled/dp/B0FCR616KD
With burnout, stress, and fatigue marking the lives of many, the need for a rejuvenating guide like Wonder and Joy for the Wired and Tired: A Guide to Finding Inspiration and Well-Being in a Wonder-Filled World should be self-evident. Quite simply, it offers a panacea for an estranged, exhausted life that teaches readers why they feel chronically burned out and how to change their lives in ways that eliminate this feeling to support positivity and strength.
This effort is no mean feat. It involves incorporating a sense of wonder into one's life journey and perspective, from the physicality of the human body and philosophical ideas of the nature of the universe to the wonders of creativity and the joy of celebrating life and God.
Dr. Lehenbauer's interdisciplinary journey offers all kinds of new reflections and connections that center its perspectives on identifying what really matters in life, whether it be internal reflection or external appreciation of the world around us.
Where most self-help books take an introspective approach, Dr. Lehenbauer's survey takes a step back to help readers discern the qualities that make life not just worth living, but worthy of celebration and sharing.
Thus, chapters offer diffuse reflections of nature and juxtapose them with insights on how to incorporate uplifting change into one's life and world (from "Embrace Curiosity - Ask questions and explore diverse topics" to "Stay Open-Minded - Welcome uncertainty and challenge assumptions.").
This blend of reflection and observation may not be what the typical self-help reader is used to. Indeed, successfully utilizing Wonder and Joy for the Wired and Tired of necessity involves taking a step back to appreciate the world around us, linking this revitalized appreciation to newfound inner contemplation and revised approaches to the world.
Libraries seeking a combination of game plan for revitalization and bigger-picture thinking about God, nature, and one's place in the scheme of things will want to recommend Wonder and Joy for the Wired and Tired to readers interested in doing more than just reading about too-familiar burnout impacts.
Packed with enlightening moments that invite readers to take time to stop and smell the roses of life, Wonder and Joy for the Wired and Tired is just the ticket for addressing the challenges of modern living.
One Life, One Accident, A Global Breakthrough
Dr. Charles T. Krebs with Martha W. Nigro
www.drcharleskrebs.com
Perkins & Wells Press
9798999136503, $18.95 Paperback/$8.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/One-Life-Accident-Global-Breakthrough/dp/B0FPBPMX7W
One Life, One Accident, A Global Breakthrough: A Leap Forward in Healing the Body and Brain is a memoir about disaster, recovery, and especially about the transformative process that accompanies life-changing events. It follows the experiences of Dr. Charles T. Krebs after a scuba diving accident prompts him to reinvent his life and perception about its purpose and possibilities.
The incident not only physically and mentally altered his trajectory, but led Dr. Krebs to eventually formulate the concept of LEAP (Life Enhancement Acupressure Protocols) for others, a program which has helped thousands of people worldwide to overcoming various challenges, from learning difficulties to physical and mental trauma.
The memoir first delves into his childhood, growth, and the quality and nature of his life before the accident. From facing bullies to fun adventures and outdoors experiences, Dr. Krebs captures the feel of a life well lived and the various forms of active relationships that he enjoyed. The movement of his roles from a marine biologist to trauma survivor to pioneering healer represents an extraordinary story in and of itself.
Six chapters review these heady experiences of youth and new adulthood before moving to the PhD science journey as he became a professor. All serve as a foundation to Part 2, which focuses on the aftermath of his move to Australia and the accident which redirected his life into an all-encompassing interest in energetic kinesiology and creating a program to help others heal and grow:
This period of brokenness and renewal fostered deep empathy for individuals facing neurological and physical impairments and led me to discover energetic kinesiology as a healing modality. What began as a personal quest for recovery prompted a shift from my career in marine biology to a life dedicated to enabling healing for others.
Dr. Krebs employs humor and a sense of adventure from the start of his book. This segues neatly into the specifics of how he developed a global healing system rooted in energetic kinesiology. His approach blends the appeal of a memoir with the scientific and medical breakthroughs of health, fitness, and recovery in a manner designed to enlighten a wide audience - even readers not well versed in medical subjects or non-traditional medicine.
The insights into fine-tuning one's life into a focus on being of service to others offer many thought-provoking examples of attitude transformation that prove every bit as enlightening as the LEAP program itself. LEAP is more than an ideal or philosophy.
It's a science-based program blending the disciplines of neuroscience, kinesiology, Chinese medicine, and ancient wisdom based on the author's researched discoveries about how the brain processes stress and learning. The integration of this science into a program that addresses some root causes of learning and neurological challenges will prove a boon to those who have struggled with traditional approaches to both conditions.
Eastern and Western medicine are combined in a novel approach that applies principles of acupressure and muscle monitoring to remedy issues in the body's energetic systems, correcting them in a process that can restore connections between brain and body to enhance not just recovery, but ongoing wellbeing.
Libraries seeking uplifting, inspiring memoirs of accident and change which spend as much time crafting the foundations of personal background as it does in building the later years of revitalized purpose and new directions will appreciate and recommend One Life, One Accident to readers who like their inspirational stories firmly rooted in personal experiences.
With its vivid "you are here" memories of past influences and present-day change, One Life, One Accident creates a warm and meaningful examination of what it means to change virtually every aspect of one's life and cultivate a new direction not just for oneself, but the greater good.
One More Chance, A Redemption Novel
Reno R. Mist
Posh Pangolin Publishers
9798998905315, $0.99 e-book; $19.99 paperback
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FBMM237W
For a moment, I didn't know where I was or even who I was. The room was dark except for a sickly orange light seeping through bedroom curtains. Disoriented, I squeezed my eyes shut as nausea crashed over me in relentless waves. When I opened them again, the grim realization hit me. I was inside a body that wasn't supposed to exist anymore - my own.
One More Chance, A Redemption Novel tackles rebirth in a different manner than most stories about death and transformation. Here, Levi has come back to life not from when he left it, but twelve years prior, at the moment he walked out on his marriage to Sloane.
His new task seems obvious: to right the wrong things he has done in the past; of which this is his greatest snafu and the biggest challenge to resolve.
How he turns his life around by making different decisions motivated by the certainty of his future makes for an engrossing blend of romance, time travel, paranormal encounters, and the steps involved in reliving one's past.
Reno R. Mist creates a moving story that proves hard to put down. As Levi navigates the hurdles that impaired his life the first time, readers receive an emotionally charged story of change that holds many pivot points of realization:
Anger was what Angie wanted me to feel. Anger meant I would do something rash, something stupid.
As Sloane becomes involved in his realizations, the plot thickens with suspense. This will delight readers interested in more than a tale of redemption and different choices alone. Mist's addition of a healthy dose of intrigue keeps readers guessing about the magical events and their outcomes, which also contributes to a story that stands out from anything similar-sounding.
Healing, surviving life and love's challenges, and the slow simmer of forces that buffet Sloane and Levi develops exquisite tension as unexpected twists unfold.
Libraries seeking a story that sounds like a romance, but flowers to embrace much more than a love story or a time travel tale of different choices will find One More Chance sports many satisfyingly unique paths towards its conclusion, making it a fine recommendation to a wider audience than romance or time travel readers alone.
Filled with thought-provoking moments of revelation on all sides, One More Chance is a winner.
Our Amazing Minds
Jeffery and Laura May
Our Amazing Minds Publishing
www.ouramazingminds.org
9798998821189, $14.99 Paperback/$19.99 Hardcover
https://www.amazon.com/Our-Amazing-Minds-Celebrating-Neurodiversity/dp/B0FMKGJFJS
Picture book readers interested in stories filled with colorful illustrations and thought-provoking inspections will find Our Amazing Minds: Celebrating Differences and Sharing the Adventure of Autism appealing. It pairs colorful illustrations by Anastasiya Halionka with an inspection of autism as introduced by young Jackson.
He and his friends are autistic. But they enjoy the same activities as anyone - soccer, field trips, and fun. Autism is blended into this overall view of disparate kids learning from and engaging in life, making for a far more balanced story than is usual in a children's book about autism.
Jeffery and Laura May emphasize an important perception from the start:
Everyone is different in their own way, and autism is just one of the many ways people can be different!
This sets the stage for better understanding on many levels as the autistic kids are introduced to young readers.
Read-aloud adults will find Our Amazing Minds uplifting, insightful, and the perfect choice for introducing the concept of not just autism, but differences, to the very young.
With its inspiring inspections of what makes the children happy and the kinds of life encounters that lead them to make different choices than some, Our Amazing Minds represents the intersection between "normal" and "special," making autistic habits understandable in a way that young children can easily grasp.
This is why libraries and read-aloud adults will want to pick Our Amazing Minds over many others on the subject. Its sense of discovery, positivity, and understanding is unparalleled.
The Vow
Jude Berman
She Writes Press
www.shewritespress.com
9781647427887, $17.99 Paperback/$15.30 Audio/$12.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Vow-Novel-Jude-Berman/dp/1647427886
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-vow-jude-berman/1145414486
The Vow represents biographical historical fiction with a feminist perspective, adopting an approach that brings to life 18th century Italian female painter Angelica Kauffman, who is determined to succeed in what is traditionally a man's world.
Her passion for art leads to rumors that she dressed like a boy to study history painting - a vocation denied to women. She also vows to never marry, making art her only commitment in life.
Love finds a way, however, and when Angelica's skills bring her into the greater world and to London, she finds herself fielding not one, but two martial possibilities that will change not only her status, but possibly her dedication to her art.
How can Angelica uphold her vow to be an independent woman if forces beyond her control drive her to subjugate her passion for traditional paths more common to women?
Jude Berman's story juggles social expectation, romance, and artistic drive in a manner that invites women to think about the impetus for independence and creation in their own lives.
Chapters unfold a compelling passion, themselves, as Angelica considers whether she can uphold a vow to a man in the same manner as she values her vows to her art and herself. As she keeps major secrets from the men around her and considers matters of the heart and soul, readers receive a vivid story of personal struggle and revelation that is vividly rendered:
The future I had hoped to begin is over before it even started. Everything I so vividly imagined has been obliterated. It as though an artist pretending to be me threw a thick layer of gesso grosso onto the canvas of my dreams, then painted their own chosen image instead. No one looking at it, not even a hundred years hence, will ever suspect my original vision was entirely different.
Berman embeds art into the very fabric of personal and interpersonal ambition, social conflict, and experiences that continually challenge Angelica to move in new directions.
She also cements these changes into a sense of the times and the dichotomies affecting male/female relationships and perceptions, creating a moving story that is historically significant and psychologically ardent.
Libraries seeking historical fiction that reads like a romance but embraces bigger-picture thinking about women's roles and challenges to success will find The Vow an acquisition powerful in its artistic history, vivid in its characterization, and highly recommendable to many patrons - even those not normally attracted to historical fiction.
Notable for its potent considerations of women's choices and influences, The Vow is also highly recommended for book clubs seeking novels that sizzle with societal and self inspection and artistic splendor.
Knot of Souls
Christine Amsden
https://christineamsden.com/wordpress
Independently Published
9798283019284, $14.99 PB / $4.99 Kindle
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F847B5HB
Knot of Souls represents urban fantasy at its most intriguing, portraying the dilemma that unfolds when Joy awakens in an alley knowing that she was murdered - and yet now seems to reside in a form that shares her dying body with an alien presence.
Shade is a Fae prince who had no intention of jumping into Joy's body in his search for a refuge from pursuers convinced he's a murderer. She just happened to be in the right place (or the wrong one, depending on perspective).
The story is reminiscent of Hal Clements's classic Needle as far as body-sharing with an alien investigator is concerned, but departs from Clements in many different ways, weaving a love story into a detective piece that involves the two disparate figures on many different levels.
Christine Amsden adopts a focus that is more embracive, employing the first person and shifting viewpoints from Joy to Shade. This allows deeper rationales and reasoning to emerge from their conjoined form that depicts both sides of the experience:
What are you afraid of?
As the last day of Joy's life flashed through her mind, I tried and failed to distance myself from her far-too-innocent question. My first thought, after realizing I wasn't alone inside Joy's body after all, had been to jump hosts, but the instant I left this hiding place I would be vulnerable.
The special challenges of working together when neither hold shared goals or experiences is nicely spun through mixed encounters and internal dialogues that reflect the difficulties Shade and Joy experience in reconciling their newfound connection with potentially dangerous life encounters:
"Damn you, Shade, every time I think we might actually start working together, you do something like this. If Hope's life weren't in danger, I swear - "
Knot of Souls spins a fine story of fantasy, investigative intrigue, cooperative thinking, and unprecedented requirements for thinking outside the box of personal experience and goals.
Libraries seeking a different form of urban fantasy replete with engrossing conundrums faced by two very different conjoined characters will find Knot of Souls intriguing, and a nice addition to urban fantasy collections.
Filled with confrontations in two very different worlds, Knot of Souls offers action and adventure tempered by interpersonal evolution to keep urban fantasy readers guessing and involved to the end.
Princess Cheyenne
Lucy Wightman
Hamilcar Publications
www.hamilcarpubs.com
9781949590869, $28.39 Hardcover/$21.99 Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Princess-Cheyenne-Bostons-Famous-Stripper/dp/1949590879
Princess Cheyenne: My Life as Boston's Most Famous Stripper inspects the vivid world of an Illinois debutante who finds herself stripping in Boston, engaged to Cat Stevens, and receiving a crown at the Naked Cabaret. Her transition and experiences through various worlds mark a powerful story in a memoir which will pop many eyes and provides much entertaining food for thought.
How did Lucy Wightman get from here:
WASP parents didn't discuss sex, money, or politics, and certainly not strippers. Informing their offspring about these conversational taboos would have been a waste of time since children learned the social graces by emulating their parents.
To encountering Yusuf Cat Stevens and converting to Islam, here?:
He was dressed in a white robe, his beard to his collarbone. Would he pass by? Would he stop to examine the stranger in the kitchen? Was my breath bad? I stepped out of the blackness into the light with nothing to lose. I presented myself, and all that was disordered about my determination calmed. The world had already told me this was possible.
"Oh! There you are, my American girl!"
The ride may be wild, but Lucy's experiences assume a logical progression that lead her ever further into the unknown, exploring social and religious options her upbringing and parents never thought about.
Lucy's encounters are juxtaposed with self-reflection to bring her responses and new possibilities to life, including those which seem incongruous with her drive to evolve something different and independent from her roots:
Whoever I was, whatever I did, wherever I was from, fell far away and I raced into the future. I would fit into the new world of Islam and have beautiful children with him. I would learn Arabic, wear the proper clothing, and do everything perfectly. I wouldn't break the rules. I would comply. I'd refused to live by others' values and now was leaping into his. Becoming a wholly other person was possible. This was my destination, a new way of being that didn't yet exist. He was all I needed. I would never let him go.
Readers will become not just immersed in, but enchanted by her journeys as she moves from stage performance to off-stage dramas and considers many new options that each come with opportunity and angst.
Libraries seeking a journey through disparate social milieus and stage performance will find Princess Cheyenne poses a rollicking, ribald, embracing experience that proves hard to put down or predict.
Filled with moments of surprise and growth, Princess Cheyenne is highly recommended for readers who would learn about not just the world of strippers and stage performers, but the forces which redirect lives.
When in Doubt, Stop the Bout
Mike Silver
Hamilcar Publications
www.hamilcarpubs.com
9781949590784, $34.99 Paperback/$24.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/When-Doubt-Stop-Bout-Revolutionary/dp/1949590771
When In Doubt, Stop the Bout: A Revolutionary Approach to Boxing Safety and Reform should be in any sports library collection and on the reading lists of boxers, coaches, and boxing managers and rings interested in keeping boxers safe.
But, it's more than a treatise about improving boxer safety. In the course of pointing out better approaches to the sport, Mike Silver paints a damning picture of how boxing has sanctioned dangerous matches, hired inept physicians whose mandate was to keep the action going under any circumstances, and set in place referees whose special interests superseded safety.
In so doing, the boxing industry as a whole has committed grave injustices, placing their own players in harm's way for the sake of creating a good and profitable game for those operating behind its scenes.
Mike Silver delves into boxing history to profile and answer some basic questions about the sport's evolutionary process:
Why would there have been many more deaths before 1921, when sixround bouts were the rule? If shorter fights are safer, shouldn't the opposite have been true? Were boxers throwing caution to the wind in the shorter fights because there was less time to establish dominance? While that is possible, another answer is more probable - the establishment of a state athletic commission in Pennsylvania in 1921, which resulted in stricter regulations and less haphazard medical supervision.
He interviews a host of industry professionals, from referees to boxers, who offer their enlightening thoughts and experiences, sometimes anonymously for obvious reasons.
Silver also broadens his survey to cover football and other sports where injury and safety are issues. He discusses medical testing, monitoring protocols, and rules, contrasting these other sports with the peculiarities and special requirements of boxing:
It is much easier for the National Football League to adjust its rules and conduct the type of medical testing and monitoring described above than it would be for professional boxing, a sport that lacks a national commissioner or any centralized authority. Further complicating the challenge is the fact that in boxing, unlike the other sports, the main target is the head, and hurting your opponent is a goal.
The result is more than a localized inspection of the boxing community alone, but a broader-based examination that places it in context with other sports safety concerns, politics, and management.
Libraries seeking a book that can add to both sports and health collections will find Silver's multifaceted approach in When In Doubt, Stop the Bout just the ticket for a well-researched examination of all the forces affecting boxing's health as an industry and its treatment of boxers.
Anyone interested in the pursuit of best practices and health-supporting sports decisions will find When In Doubt, Stop the Bout key to not just understanding the boxing world's history and how it is conducted today, but revised possibilities for a better sport in the future, all delivered in easily-understood discussions that any reader can readily absorb.
Tiny Shifts
Jake Thiessen, PhD
www.jakethiessen.com
Contineo Publishing
9798999091703, $18.99 Paperback/$8.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Tiny-Shifts-Changes-Radically-Relationship/dp/B0FMYSVRJG
Tiny Shifts: Simple Shifts to Radically Improve Your Relationship isn't about relationship-building or years of intensive therapy, struggling to reach an elusive dream. It's about making the kinds of small shifts in perspective and approach which lead to an overall bigger change and picture. Thus, it addresses many common challenges to love that readers will find much easier to tackle than the usual weighty psychotherapy approach.
This book contains nearly 80 short essays grouped into 11 sections by topic. Each essay presents a relationship truth that readers can immediately apply and is followed by a "Consider this" reflection question to help personalize the essay's content. Delightful line drawings by award-winning artist Robinson C. Smith accompany and complement the essays.
Why the need for what seems yet another book on the topic? Dr. Jake Thiessen explains how Tiny Shifts differs from most:
When a couple encounters a relationship challenge, conventional wisdom says they need to improve their communication and problem-solving skills. Many good books have been written on these skills for couples, and this book offers a few as well. Additional and improved skills are great. But if they are not accompanied by a substantially different perspective on the interconnectedness of their relating, they may simply amplify old, habitual ways of being together. In other words, what they need is a better understanding of the often-subtle effect each partner has on the other and how even a single such effect can alter the direction of an interaction.
Chapters promote and show how to better listen to yourself and your partner, how to tackle larger concerns (such as what to do when incompatibility arises), and provide blueprints for identifying and embarking on simple relationship shifts that can lead to better conversations and improved problem solving.
For example: it's easy to instantly respond to a situation or interaction, but often the best course is an emotional time-out for self-assessment before engagement:
When an emotion shows up, imagine a space where you and the emotion are both present. Let that space be large enough for you to maintain an appropriate distance from the emotion so you can respond to it without being entangled with it. Finding the right distance from your emotions helps you develop a healthy relationship with them.
Another clue to better interactions and results lies in taking newfound self-awareness to a different level by building a personal foundation for understanding, then taking another step into relationship adaptation and revised interactions:
Being aware of your actions and their implications helps you understand the effect you have on others. This sounds easier than it is because while we may be aware of our actions, we often miss how those actions affect others.
To increase awareness of actions and their implications, imagine watching yourself on a screen. This will help you see yourself objectively. You may notice that many of your actions are habitual and done unconsciously. If you then consider your partner's responses to what you are doing, you will begin to see the impact of your actions.
By breaking down dysfunction and misunderstandings to a deeper level of personal rather than just interpersonal interactions, Dr. Thiessen builds the kinds of connections with self that translate well to delivering the lessons to one's partner for a more balanced, integrated couples-supporting approach.
Libraries looking to add to their self-help couples relationship collections will find Tiny Shifts a clear and simple winner. Its digestible bites of self-understanding and better relationship patterns offers its lessons via exercises and examples that only require an inquiring mind ready to self-examine and change in order to prove invitingly successful for loving couples seeking small ways to clear the big hurdles in their lives.
Boo!
Erin Melody
www.erinmelody.com
Independently Published
9798992617702, $11.99 Paperback/$21.99 Hardcover/$3.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Boo-Erin-Melody/dp/B0FG33H1RL
Boo! is a simple, compelling picture book story about little ghost Ivory, who can't be effectively scary because she, herself, is scared of her own voice.
Her job is to spook the farm. Instead, she spooks only herself. She can't even say the word "boo" without jumping!
Who else can she consult but a wise old owl that counsels her, but doesn't quite succeed, despite her clever strategy. This sends Boo on a journey of self-acceptance and advise-seeking to find a revised way of frightening others that doesn't scare her, too.
Erin Melody's enchanting story will engage kids interested in confronting their fears, understanding the power of language and adaptation, and developing pride in their abilities.
A barnyard of animals stands (or flies) ready to help Boo, adding insights on friendship and cooperative sharing to this simple saga of a scaredy-ghost.
Libraries and read-aloud adults looking for simple, fun stories of how to build courage and connections while addressing personal fears will find Boo! an uplifting, fun story.
Its message deserves widespread recommendation to young audiences who will find Boo!'s large-size drawings and inviting animal countenances to be amusing, and its ghostly protagonist anything but scary.
Betrayal of Trust: A Medical Thriller
Geoffrey M. Cooper
https://geofcooper.com
Captain Thomas Publishing
9798992426113, ebook $4.99, paperback $15.95
https://www.amazon.com/Betrayal-Trust-Thriller-Richmond-Thrillers/dp/B0FKHBNM4K
Think Robin Cook when considering Betrayal of Trust: A Medical Thriller - but with a focus on expanding the relationship and connections between Brad Parker and Karen Richmond even further in this ninth book of a series about the dynamic investigative duo.
The reward for Dr. Eric Salton's discovery of a drug that could cure lung cancer is death. Another murder quickly follows, and the same woman's DNA is identified at both scenes as the bodies keep piling up.
So, why does investigator Brad fall under suspicion? Because his undeniable professional connection to the victims indicates he holds special knowledge about the woman's motivations for murder.
His familiar sidekick Karen (from previous stories) once again works with him on this case, but the two are forced to field the world of academic medicine in new ways as strange truths about research and discovery edge into dangerous territory.
As the two uncover a professor's harassment, a student's suicide, and connections between these events and more, they begin to unfold a puzzle of epic proportions as Shirley plays cat-and-mouse games with investigators who edge ever closer to an impossible truth.
Geoffrey M. Cooper expands his character focus to perp Shirley and others' interactions and lives, flushing out Brad and Karen's focus with insights and drama to keep the plot mercurial and its outcome unpredictable.
Readers won't always find themselves rooting for the good side (or, will find that its identification shifts) as the characters unfold believable, even likeable, rationales behind their choices and actions ... even murder.
These options also include moral and ethical quandaries about how to conduct scientific research while escaping the consequences of one's actions:
Maybe it would be smart to cut and run. Fake identification papers and an ample supply of cash were all ready to go. She could get in the car now and be in Canada tonight. Nobody would miss her, not really. And after a little time passed, she could start a new life and carry on her work. Someplace where her discoveries could immediately be used to benefit the people who needed them, without the need to sacrifice others as "controls."
Betrayal of Trust assumes the guise of a police procedural but, in reality, covers so much more, as all the characters are forced to confront their goals, fears, careers, and relationships.
Libraries either seeing satisfaction with prior Brad and Karen investigative works or looking for standalone medical thrillers that shine will find Betrayal of Trust a 'must' for readers attracted to Cook-style thrillers.
Immersed in a sense of discovery and growth, Betrayal of Trust introduces new facets of relationships and connections that medical thriller readers will find compelling food for thought.
Halley's Gathering
William Overstreet
www.williamoverstreet.com
WRP
9798992216400, $22.95 paper; $8.99 ebook
https://www.amazon.com/Halleys-Gathering-William-Overstreet/dp/B0DZQ42QRS
Halley's Gathering is no light read, but is a sweeping epic of Native American literature, history, and culture. It opens in 1910 New Mexico territory, where Julia Halley, who owns the Many Springs Canyon Trading Post on the Navajo Reservation, has assembled a circle of Navajo and Anglo friends, all with their own stories.
Julia and her husband Will have made their home in a harsh environment far different from her comfort zone. It's a world of unpredictable winters and high-desert landscapes, very distant from her New England origins.
The saga opens as Julia's taciturn Navajo/Hopi friend Clement Yazzie has rescued surveyor Owen Rouse, who was lost in a storm. Owen becomes the latest of the visitors who, for different reasons, center their lives on Julia's Many Springs Trading Post, an environment which is:
...much like every other small reservation store, where the intent was to provide the Navajos with as great a variety of what they might need as possible. To Julia's way of thinking, that was the trading post's only purpose...
A wide cast of characters converges on the trading post in response to need and the opportunity to interact with others, from grizzled old Navajo healer Toya to photographer Pete Pietrowski, a former Franciscan brother.
As these lives dovetail, the boundaries between indigenous people and Anglos blur with understanding, revelation, and interactions. These bring to life various facets of reservation experience and how outsiders become part of the Southwestern landscape.
Clashes between the Old West and Navajo ways of life are depicted through the eyes and experiences of a broad cast of characters whose histories range as far back as the 1860s and whose futures, with a notable exception, promise new opportunities (as well as ongoing adversity).
Especially vivid and notable is the time William Overstreet takes to root this gathering of tribes in a sense of place and history. Readers need not be familiar with the Southwest or its people in order to appreciate the various survival tactics and growth opportunities employed by each character, both individually and as a representative of their roots.
This atmospheric sense of place and contrasts steeps readers in a myriad of choices and considerations as Julia moves through different lives and landscapes:
THE RETURN TRAIN, approaching Gallup, gradually slowed, permitting Julia a welcome view of the red sandstone cliffs, crowned by the towers of Church Rock, to the north. The East had felt so claustrophobic, with the trees leafing out in their various greens. All of Albany seemed to crowd her: the horizon lay obstructed in every direction, the roads beyond the city curved into hidden esses, and even the damp air weighed her down. She hadn't realized how deeply she'd absorbed the pleasure of endless distances out here, which not even the soot and fumes coughed out by the locomotive could diminish. She did, and yet didn't, know what awaited her at Many Springs.
Libraries will want to highly recommend Halley's Gathering for its warm, embracive sense of place and cultures, for its ability to blend historical precedent with modern dilemmas, and, most of all, for its diversity of characters and ethnic experiences that keeps the story thoroughly engrossing and personal.
Rich in inspections of women's places and roles during these times as Julia forges a new life from the ashes of a relationship dashed in hope and dreams, Halley's Gathering offers a warm place around the fire of turn of the century Southwest experience that is compelling and hard to set aside.
The Faithful Ones
Kathleen J. Waites
www.kathleenjwaites.squarespace.com
Invictus Press
9798998969102, $15.99 Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Faithful-Ones-Kathleen-J-Waites/dp/B0FBKZSJNY
The Faithful Ones is a novel inspired by a true story about a draftee who is incarcerated as a POW at the Philadelphia State Hospital at Byberry during World War II. The action centers on the atrocities committed there and the conscientious objectors employed as hospital attendants who strive to combat them. It reviews the impact of institutional decisions of cruelty on family members and patients and exposes how efforts to do good can be warped by institutional mandates.
The novel brings all these facets to life through the eyes and experiences of sketch artist and incarcerated soldier Ed, who strives to escape a nightmare of condoned abuse without the aid of his family, who is largely alienated from his suffering.
It is only his young sister who is willing to examine family and political structures, delving into family and institutional secrets that have long been hidden in both environments to try to dig out the truth about her brother's incarceration and real state of mind.
Kathleen J. Waites brings her story, set during World War II, to life with descriptions steeped in the ethos of the era as Mary ferrets out the truths unraveling behind different closed doors:
It seemed like their whole entire house was under a gloom bonnet. Like Captain Midnight on the Captain Midnight show, Mary was picking up signals. She just didn't know how to decode them.
Sensitive readers triggered by mental health conundrums, vivid accounts of abuse, and challenges to seeking freedom may find the novel's intensity of experience challenging:
Joseph, where was Joseph? What had become of the boy? What would become of all of them trapped in hell's forgotten pit? He'd reached the bottom of sorrow. He was sure of it. There couldn't be more beneath this.
But, beneath this examination of military, social, and psychological assault lays the germ of discovery and transformation, the truths that lead each character to emerge from their trials stronger. Readers will be equally strengthened by the positive notes that emerge from disaster.
Libraries interested in vivid representations the damage wrought by corrupt mental health institutions, questionable military polices, and familial dysfunction will find The Faithful Ones a valuable and thought-provoking collection addition.
Suitable for book club discussion groups as well as individual reading preferences, this harrowing story of unchecked institutional abuse, self-discovery and, ultimately, redemption holds many insights worthy of debate and digestion. It proves hard to put down, blending documented facts with fiction in a manner that is truly enlightening.
I'll Be With You Wherever You Are
Michael Finn
https://www.michaelfinnbooks.com
Mascot Kids!
c/o Mascot Books
www.mascotbooks.com
9798891383470, $19.95
https://www.amazon.com/Ill-Be-You-Wherever-Are/dp/B0FC42ZBPX
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/ill-be-with-you-wherever-you-are-michael-finn/1147561495
I'll Be With You Wherever You Are pairs lyrical reflection with lovely illustrations by Agus Prajogo and Yohanes Bastian. It opens with an evocative dialogue between father and son:
"Daddy, will you live forever?"
"I'll be here as long as I can, my love."
"But someday, you'll leave me?"
This kicks off an important survey of promises between son and father to preserve their relationship even in the face of death:
Whatever you're doing, I'll always be near.
One truth this world holds is that everyone grows old.
There will be a day when it seems like I'm not around.
But all you have to do is look, and I'll be found.
The two also swear to remain connected and pursue healthy, supportive goals in life, from eating well to having faith, trusting in what cannot be seen, and contemplating the possibility of other lifetimes (a notion which may stymie some read-aloud adults, while delighting others):
This time around is just the start.
I think it's essential that you should know, we have so many more lifetimes to go.
Libraries and adults seeking explorations of life, death, faith, and connection can easily use I'll Be With You Wherever You Are to address the concerns of youngsters who are just beginning to understand death and loss.
Filled with simple dialogue and insights accessible to all ages, I'll Be With You Wherever You Are is a lovely exploration of everlasting connection that will comfort and educate while providing a story that embraces the reality of death and how a caring father prepares his son for the inevitable.
Take It To the Limit Book Three: Faith, Hope, and Murder
Linda Opdyke
www.lindaopdyke.net
Independently Published
9798294613679, $14.95 Paperback / $2.99 Kindle
https://www.amazon.com/Take-Limit-Three-Faith-murder/dp/B0FKBVTX1S
Take It To the Limit Book Three: Faith, Hope, and Murder returns PI Ethan Jenks to another case in which his skills are tested and the too-short fuse of his wife Mickey threatens the outcome. Yes, she is now a licensed investigator, but that doesn't mean she has the perfect temperament for the job.
The charged relationship between them in the office is outlined from the start:
She rose and hugged him. "You won't be sorry," she assured him. "I'll prove to you that your trust in me is justified."
It was all he could do not to say It's not you I don't trust. It's your temper and your inability to keep your mouth shut.
An attempt at car theft which involves a thief who knows Ethan's Jeep but not Ethan, Mickey's involvement with the lying Liz, and a backwoods meeting turned deadly are but a few of the struggles the couple faces individually and together as events heat up.
A satisfying note to the investigative component is how richly Linda Opdyke portrays the increasingly frayed professional relationship between husband and wife PIs:
He sat at the table, put his hands to the sides of his forehead, then smacked his palms onto the table. None of his anger had dissipated and he yelled, "What does it take for you to slow down and think before you do something stupid?"
At odds are Ethan's cautious savvy and Micky's desire to run headlong into trouble to save people at all costs.
Between Cody's grief at what his decisions have led to and a quest to prove Paul Michaels a killer, various characters lend powerful personalities, motives, and insights to a story that is compelling both on investigative and psychological levels.
Libraries seeking PI suspense stories that are as thoroughly steeped in interpersonal conflict as they are in whodunit will relish the special brand of tension and development that leads to many unexpected twists and turns in Take It To the Limit Book Three: Faith, Hope, and Murder.
Replete with moments of revelation and potential transformation, the story is compelling, realistic, and especially hard to put down.
The Ghost of Khartoum
B.R. O'Hagan
Pedee Creek Press
9781734226324, $11.95 Paperback/$3.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Ghost-Khartoum-B-R-OHagan-ebook/dp/B0FLRFKJR7
The Ghost of Khartoum represents haunting historical fiction at its best. Thomas Scoundrel returns in a third book that takes place in 1884, two years after the action-packed foray into Scoundrel's past that made Scoundrel in the Thick such an absorbing swashbuckling adventure.
Here, Thomas foregoes his usual action-packed career of chasing bandits and training new recruits for the Mexican Army for a new endeavor: writing an article about the new luxury train Orient Express.
His train ride inserts him into the life of Egyptologist's daughter Helene de Bovet and her mission to clear her father's sullied reputation. Intent on helping her, Thomas finds himself in Egypt at a dig locale where war is brewing between the British and a repressed warrior tribe lead by the fierce Mahdi.
As fast-paced action moves from battlefield encounters to a Sudanese prison, a Bedouin warlord's kidnapping of Helene, and Colonel Scoundrel's encounter with a host of disparate forces, B.R. O'Hagan cements action with atmospheric descriptions that inject a "you are here" feel throughout to bring readers directly into the times and places:
The air inside was thick with the scent of powder and aged wood. The faint starlight trickling in revealed rows of stacked rifles, ironbanded ammunition crates, and dozens of 50-pound powder kegs. Cannonballs lay in deliberate piles, their dull surfaces gleaming like malignant eyes in the gloom.
Battle scenes involve moment-by-moment combat while Thomas's encounters with desert tribes add elements of cultural discovery and historical revelation to the plot, enhancing its grabbing ability to capture and represent the moment and the peoples of these times:
"So treasured are these horses that many Bedouin bring them inside the tent at night to sleep beside them."
Thomas chuckled. "I have heard the tales about Bedouins and female goats, my friend, but this is the first I knew they were also attracted to horses."
Samhi laughed and flicked a small pebble at Thomas. "The day may come when your life depends upon Saher being able to take just one more step, Colonel. Pray that day does not arrive, but if it should, think on this moment and ready your apology."
As with its predecessors, The Ghost of Khartoum is rich in action, replete with unexpected twists, and threaded with wry humor that offsets serious matters of honor, trust, and survival.
Libraries seeking a standalone story of military encounters, mystery, and adventure will find The Ghost of Khartoum suitable for collection addition whether or not they have the prior Thomas Scoundrel series titles (but, they should!).
Replete with fast-paced adventure supplemented by full-bodied characters whose psyches and concerns shine, The Ghost of Khartoum is another powerful story that flushes out both Scoundrel's interests and the trials of his times that is highly recommended for leisure readers and historical fiction enthusiasts alike.
The Apple and The Stone
Hartford G. Dawson, PhD
www.HartfordDawson.com
JAD Media Enterprise, Inc.
9798999563415, $21.99 hardcover/$14.99 paperback/$6.99 ebook
https://www.amazon.com/Apple-Stone-Success-Strategies-Goliath-Killer-ebook/dp/B0FPGHWVNB
While readers who choose The Apple and The Stone: 12 Proven Success Strategies Used by Steve Jobs and Goliath-Killer David may think this book will be about business success, in fact the topic is much broader than monetary success strategies. That's what makes the book a winner for readers confronting impossible-sounding obstacles on many different levels.
Dr. Hartford G. Dawson focuses on setbacks and approaches to overcoming them with an eye to reviewing self-limiting messages of negativity and confusion which make challenges seem so much bigger.
Examples from Steve Jobs and David and Goliath accompany admonitions to persevere and overcome:
Silence the voices that echo defeat. Confront the pain that clouds your vision. Dry your tears of despair. Face your Goliaths - and expect to win. You can win. You must. Like David, you will.
Whether these lessons are applied to personal, social, business or political situations, they maintain a relevancy and powerful force centered upon "reframing the impossible as an opportunity for growth." Under this vision and approach, obstacles become prospects for growth that promise the richness of not just singular success, but a wider-reaching approach to life.
Of special note are the specifics Dr. Dawson addresses about common barriers to achievement and exactly why they are so impactful:
Procrastination immobilizes you and keeps dreams locked in thought rather than action. It injects fear and doubt to seep into spaces meant for movement. It does not strike in obvious ways; it works subtly, chips away at confidence, and whispers excuses that sound reasonable but lead to stagnation. If left unchecked, it kills momentum, shatters consistency, slowly dismantles progress, and leaves you with regrets.
The twelve strategies to break these self-limiting perceptions and habits is even accompanied by a downloadable app (Breaking Goliaths) which helps reinforce the book's foundations.
Libraries seeking achievement-oriented guides that go beyond imparting advice and admonitions to outline the nuts and bolts of a program designed to propel self-help readers onto better paths of living will find The Apple and The Stone's thought-provoking, actionable outline just the ticket for top recommendation to a wide range of patrons seeking change on different levels.
Filled with clarity, insights on how Jobs refused to accept the status quo and persevered beyond common expectation, and guidelines readers can absorb to do the same, The Apple and The Stone is outstanding in its approach and specific in its tips.
The Devil Drinks Monsoons
SueBird Sparrow
www.SueBirdWrites.com
Bayou Wolf Press
9798988635482, $18.99 Paperback/$3.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Devil-Drinks-Monsoons-Suebird-Sparrow/dp/B0FHT7PZLD
Besides its exceptionally compelling, novel title, The Devil Drinks Monsoons excels in a powerful sense of place and culture, iced with surprises. The first is the nature of the monsoon referred to in the title.
The second is murder.
As the New Orleans-based intrigue unfolds, readers are treated to a tale steeped in 'you are here' experiences that capture the crypts, streets, and culture of Louisiana.
Trigger alert: violence against women is one of the threads in this story. But it is described in circumspect terms that enhance the tale without overly emphasizing the violent overlay of experience, resulting in just enough tension and description to support the atmosphere of an evolving story.
From attacks to characters whose disparate personalities contribute to inviting discoveries, SueBird Sparrow takes the time to build her scenarios and inhabitants through dialogue that adds to the descriptive process:
"See if you can get Miss Jeanne to bring some of that awesome wine she brought last time. What was it called? Blood of My Enemies? Something like that, but French. I love her style. She really doesn't care what people say about her, she just doubles down."
Graveyards containing the graves of Southern leaders from the War Between the States, vampires, crypts and victims, and one woman's retribution for the past coalesce in a gripping story. It juxtaposes the special interests of old vampire Jeanne (aren't they supposed to be ageless? Sparrow provides an intriguing twist on legend, here), against a baby used to trap a fiend, and cantankerous private investigator Richard's need to redeem himself from his own undeniably dark deeds.
This interplay of character special interests and perceptions dovetails nicely with a story that creates just the right degree of tension and mystery, set against a New Orleans backdrop that smacks of some of the most compelling descriptions in the bestselling Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.
The result will please a wide audience of library patrons and readers looking for a powerful blend of mystery, supernatural elements, romance, and explorations of the mental health and dysfunction of evil entities.
Diane C. Donovan, Senior Reviewer
Donovan's Literary Services
www.donovansliteraryservices.com
Gary Roen's Bookshelf
The Characters Within
Sunshine Rodgers
https://www.sunshinerodgers.com
Rwg Publishing
9781648301711, $29.99 HC / $3.99 Kindle
https://www.amazon.com/Characters-Within-Sunshine-Rodgers/dp/1648301711
Sunshine Rodgers adult novels, have always focused on an aspect of the entertainment world. Once again, "The Characters Within" takes readers behind the scenes of Cheddar and Such, a major theme park in Orlando. Brittany Myers is hired to be a part of the attraction. She believes it is a wonderful place to be greeting so many people from all over the world, enjoying the company of her co-workers, and other aspects, but ten years later she is disenchanted with just about everything in her life. She is burning out, dull drums have set in for her existence, except one aspect. She has always believed, she is a talented writer, who one day will be a published author. Rejected by many different publishers, she is encouraged by their responses, that offer suggestions and hints to her to not fold her cards. It's the one thing that keeps her focused, determined, to achieve her goal. "The Characters Within" is several stories rolled into a wonderful narrative that is for anyone who has ever been dissatisfied where they are in either their professional or personal life and to believe they can accomplish their ambitions.
The Room At The End Of The Hall
Susan McCormick
Carroll Press
www.carrollpress.com
9780998618777, $17.99 pbk / $4.99 Kindle
https://www.amazon.com/Room-at-End-Hall/dp/0998618772
Susan McCormick takes a break from her wonderful "The Fog Ladies" mystery series to expand her talents in "The Room At The End Of The Hall." Dr. Michael Baker, comes home from Boston to Seattle, to take care of his sick mother who is in the same room as one of his patients who should not have died. Later there is a note left for him stating, to not trust him as a doctor. More circumstances happen to him, and others he is overseeing. Situations get darker as the fast-paced writing and well fleshed out characters drive the narrative along with enough twists and turns of conflicts to the very end. "The Room At The End Of The Hall" is a suspenseful medical thriller that will have readers rapidly turning pages to the last page.
Phantom Academy
Christine Virnig
Aladdin
c/o Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing
https://www.simonandschuster.com/kids
9781665980364, $18.99 HC / $8.99 Kindle
https://www.amazon.com/Phantom-Academy-Christine-Virnig/dp/1665980362
"Phantom Academy" has a unique premise of a boy who dies from a freak accident involving a coconut. Now he is a ghost taken to live with others who are a part of a school. This unlikely beginning draws readers with its twist of narrative. I lost interest early, when the author bombards an annoying aspect to detract from enjoying the work. For others "Phantom Academy" may be enjoyable fare. I very simply am tired of this type of humor.
The Pied Piper: Evil Returns
Chris Coad Taylor
JoHazel Publishing
9780997564594, $12.00 pbk / $2.99 Kindle
https://www.amazon.com/Pied-Piper-Evil-Returns-Amber/dp/0997564598
"The Pied Piper: Evil Returns" the third in the Amber Series of Ybor City, is by far is the best in this dark and sinister sequence of procedural works. Chris Coad Taylor keeps getting better and better with her mystery novels that take place in the Tampa area. This time out Joe Lopez leads a task force of law enforcement agencies including the FBI on the trail of an individual who is kidnapping children, they suspect for, the sex trafficking network worldwide. His pregnant wife Amber helps unlock other aspects in the case as it unfolds. The Rainbow Murders a cold case never solved is back on the agenda as well that some feel may be related. "The Pied Piper: Evil Returns" is a page turner of suspense that unwinds like a ticking time bomb to its final explosive conclusion.
You Can't Cheat Death: A Magnolia Hill Mystery
Peggy Doviak
https://peggydoviak.com
The Wild Rose Press
https://www.thewildrosepress.com
9781509257355, $17.99 pbk / $4.99 Kindle
https://www.amazon.com/Cant-Cheat-Death-Magnolia-Mystery/dp/1509257357
"You Can't Cheat Death" is a fun cozy mystery, by a talented author, who promises there will be more, forthcoming stories. Jillian Bradford has a pretty good life, establishing her business of personal financial planner, in the community in Oklahoma she lives in, All is going well, until Stan Savage, a friend from high school comes back to town. From then on she must do everything she can to protect herself from the terrible things he has begun. More so, when it comes out he is killed in car crash. From then on there are numerous suspects that include Jillian, who is determined to get to the bottom of things, to establish her innocence in his demise. There is also a fun trivia fact. A police officer is named Jeff Stone. For those who remember The Donna Reed Show, that was the name of the son character played by Paul Peterson. "You Can't Cheat Death" is great opening, to a new series of appealing whodunnits.
The Season of Risks
Susan Hubbard
Simon & Schuster
www.simonandschuster.com
9781439183427, pbk $14.00,/Kindle $6.99
https://www.amazon.com/Season-Risks-Ethical-Vampire-Novel/dp/1439183422
This third novel in Hubbard's vampire series has a lot of conflicts going on that move the story along at a nice pace. The characters are very different from other genre fare because she depicts the people with real life situations and they are not monsters, as we are used to reading. One of the characters is running for president of the United States. He has to keep secret that he is a vampire. The work is filled with many things fans of the genre will not agree with, but she handles them so well with explanations of why things are the way they are so that the complaints are bogus. I like this series and want to see where the author goes next time.
Behind the Scenes at Downton Abbey
Emma Rowley, author
Foreword by Executive Producer Gareth Neame
St. Martin's Press
www.stmartins.com
9781250047908, HC $29.99/Kindle $9.99
https://www.amazon.com/Behind-Scenes-Downton-Abbey-Backstage/dp/1250047900
Its time to celebrate the new Downton Abbey movie by watching the two films and the mega hit 6 season TV show on Blu-ray or streaming and catch up on everything Downton with "Behind the Scenes At Downton Abbey: The Official Backstage Pass to the Set, The Actors and the Drama" The author delve into the world of Downton and tells fans little known facts about the show. Some of the things are the detail to the clothing for the show, the actors, and their experience, some of the attention the stars have had from fans, and lots more. The book is easy to read and filled with so many wonderful pictures that add to the whole Downton mystique. "No fan of the series should miss "Downton Abbey the Official Backstage Pass to the Set, the Actors and the Drama"
Downton Abbey Rules For Household Staff
St. Martins Griffin
c/o St. Martin's Press
www.stmartins.com
9781250066329, HC $14.99/Kindle $2.99
https://www.amazon.com/Downton-Abbey-Rules-Household-Staff/dp/1250066328
Downton Abbey continues to thrill and amaze the world with so many ways to enjoy it, before you see the new epic addition to the long running series. "Downton Abbey Rules For Household Staff" is for the many fans to know the protocols of the servants. Some of the things covered are the many different types of jobs, proper dress for each situation, proper terms to be used, and lots more that give so much insight to the world of service. "Downton Abbey Rules For Household Staff" is a very revealing look behind the scenes at Downton Abbey.
Rattlesnake Romeo
Joy Wellman
Pinnacle Books
9780786017065, pbk $6.50, No Kindle
https://www.amazon.com/Rattlesnake-Romeo-Joy-Wellman-2005-04-05/dp/B01FKU3MWC
Society often asks, "How could children kill their parents?" In "Rattlesnake Romeo" it is easy to see why. Valessa and her two male friends murdered her mother Vicki Lyn Robinson. The three were into the rave clubs and drug scene in Tampa, Florida. In a drugged state they went to the Robinson's home and killed Valessa's mother in the kitchen. Later they left the body in a trash can on an empty lot then went on a spree with her credit card. Police later tracked them down and had a shootout in Texas. The story was broadcast on "48 Hours" Readers now get a chance to peek behind the surface and see what happens when the wrong type of person influences a teenager.
Speed Demon
Goldie Gutenberg
Pinnacle Books
9780786017218, pbk $6.50/No Kindle
https://www.amazon.com/Speed-Demon-Pinnacle-True-Crime/dp/078601721X
"Speed Demon" is the true story of a rich queen of market research who killed her own daughter, her daughter's best friend and caused their friend to sustain permanent brain damage, when she roared down a highway, lost control of her BMW and smashed into a tree. Her world of wealth is toppled as she fights to stay out of jail by blaming the cruise control, on her car instead of taking responsibility for her actions. Many will remember this local case that was shown on an episode of "48 Hours." Speed Demon delves deep into the world of Mary Hill and shows that this case is a travesty of justice.
Gary Roen
Senior Reviewer
Helen Dumont's Bookshelf
Food, Clothes, Men, Gas, and Other Problems
Martha Rosenberg
Independently Published
9798304898270, $14.95, PB, 248pp
https://www.amazon.com/Food-Clothes-Men-Other-Problems/dp/B0DS94XHDC
Synopsis: Why do men give Valentine's Day gifts that require apologies? Why do medical researchers tackle obscure diseases but skip PMS, which affects half the planet? And why has microwave popcorn in the office become the culinary equivalent of a car alarm?
With the publication of "Food, Clothes, Men, Gas, and Other Problems", Martha Rosenberg provides rollicking explorations of modern day absurdities ranging from the rise of housing rage in the COVID era to the hazards of bumper stickers in the age of road rage. Rosenberg dissects these and many more aspects of everyday life with the precision of a journalist and the wit of a stand-up comic.
What would the Marlboro Man think of smartphones and bottled water? Why do holiday diets never survive the appetizers? And are fashion buyers still necessary when trends make no sense? With humor and insight, Rosenberg skewers the cultural norms we accept without question - until she points them out.
In a nod to her roots in satire, Rosenberg also reflects on her friendship with the late John Hughes, the National Lampoon writer and director behind The Breakfast Club and Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. His irreverent humor and knack for capturing the quirks of human behavior echo in her sharp, observational style.
But "Food, Clothes, Men, Gas, and Other Problems " is far more than a collections of punchlines. Rosenberg's background as a medical reporter lends depth to her humor, whether she's interviewing experts like Brene Brown and William Cope Moyers or reflecting on the rebellious spirit of cartoonist John Callahan.
Critique: From work, to relationships, to popular culture, the comedic insights of Martha Rosenberg will prove as insightfully memorable and thought-provoking as they are belly chuckle to laugh-out-loud funny. This paperback edition of "Food, Clothes, Men, Gas, and Other Problems" is especially and unreservedly recommended for personal reading lists, as well as community and college/university library Contemporary Humor and Contemporary American Biography/Memoir collections.
Editorial Note: Martha Rosenberg is an investigative reporter whose work has appeared in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), Consumer Reports, Public Citizen, the Center for Health Journalism at USC Annenberg, the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University and other top outlets.
Ethel Marie
Kelly Nicholson
Ozark Mountain Publishing, Inc.
www.ozarkmt.com
9781962858380, $23.00, PB, 333pp
https://www.amazon.com/Ethel-Marie-Minnesota-Understand-Destiny/dp/1962858383
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/ethel-marie-kelly-nicholson/1146811814
Synopsis: With the publication of "Ethel Marie: How a Minnesota Farm Girl Helped Me to Understand Life, Love, and Human Destiny", Kelly Nicholson (a longtime academician) recalls his life and the shaping influence of his mother, a woman of plain origins who gave him insight, by her example, into the timeless wisdom of the world's great spiritual traditions.
"Ethel Marie", in part, is a memoir of Kelly Nicholson's youth and subsequent adventures. Beneath its surface lies the enduring question of how we might acquire a sense, amid a world of competing influences, of what life means and where we are ultimately headed. Its thesis is that we gain insight not merely from analytical scholarship but also from our daily flesh and blood encounters with those around us.
Critique: Articulate, exceptional, informative, thoughtful, thought-provoking, "Ethel Marie: How a Minnesota Farm Girl Helped Me to Understand Life, Love, and Human Destiny" by Kelly Nicholson is a deftly crafted blending of memoir, biography, insight and inspiration that will prove of particular appeal and value to readers with an interest in metaphysics, personal and family traditions, as well as 'New Age' sensibilities. Occasionally illustrated with B/W historical photographs, "Ethel Marie: How a Minnesota Farm Girl Helped Me to Understand Life, Love, and Human Destiny" is especially and unreservedly recommended for personal, professional, community, and college/university library collections.
Editorial Note: Kelly Nicholson is a much-traveled college and university instructor and veteran sportswriter who has taught philosophy and religious studies on three continents for the better part of half a century. He holds degrees and certifications from the University of Washington, Claremont Graduate School, and Cambridge University in England. A former firefighter and amateur boxer, he currently teaches philosophy part-time at Utah Valley University in Orem.
Helen Dumont
Reviewer
John Taylor's Bookshelf
Pedaling Through the Years: Stories of a Cycling Life
Jonathan Van Coops
Regent Press
www.regentpress.net
9781587907050, $44.95, PB, 212pp
https://www.amazon.com/Pedaling-Through-Years-Stories-Cycling/dp/1587907054
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/pedaling-through-the-years-jonathan-van-coops/1147426032
Synopsis: Over time, every serious cyclist accumulates stories about their riding adventures. That's just how "Pedaling Through the Years: Stories of a Cycling Life" by Jonathan Van Coops came to be published.
With tales of the 'first' bike, cycling to the 1984 summer Olympics in Los Angeles, racing in the World's Toughest Triathlon, seeing the Tour de France first hand and more, "Pedaling Through the Years" comprises a lifelong cyclist's memoir a collection of sixteen stories that illustrate cycling's blissful, funny or frightful moments and its unending potential for making unique two-wheeled experiences entertaining and unforgettable.
Critique: This large format (8.5 x 0.55 x 11 inches, 1.53 pounds) paperback edition of "Pedaling Through the Years: Stories of a Cycling Life" by dedicated cyclist Jonathan Van Coops features both B/W and Color photographs in support of inherently fascinating stories of his cycling adventures, commentaries and insights. Exceptionally well written, organized and presented, this original and unique edition of "Pedaling Through the Years: Stories of a Cycling Life" from Regent Press is especially and unreservedly recommended for personal, community, and college/university library Cycling, Biography, and Travelogue collections.
Editorial Note: Jonathan Van Coops was one of those kids to whom a bicycle gave wings. He grew up in the 1960s riding the city streets of San Francisco area's East Bay flatlands. By 1970, he had nailed cleats on to his cycling shoes and began riding his modest French ten-speed road bike gradually further into the hilly Regional Parks and watershed lands east of Berkeley. A lover of bike racing but not a licensed racer himself, he became a decent climber by necessity and began focusing on longer distance rides in his teens and twenties. Three and four-hour rides covering 60 miles or more became regular weekend workouts. Throughout his thirties and forties he rode constantly and completed the various San Francisco area 'century' rides and an array of west coast long-distance cycling events. After many miles on the trusty Peugeot, he began assembling a varied collection of bikes in the 1980s. Now at 70, his jaunts on the 'Red Mikk' are typically in the one or two hour range, leaving plenty of time for his other passions: cartography, writing and a growing group of granddaughters
John Taylor
Reviewer
Mary Cowper's Bookshelf
Phantoms of Christmas Past
Paul Weatherhead
www.paulweatherhead.com
6th Books
c/o Collective Ink Books
https://www.collectiveinkbooks.com
9781803418407, $17.95, PB, 200pp
https://www.amazon.com/Phantoms-Christmas-Past-Festive-Hoaxes/dp/1803418400
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/phantoms-of-christmas-past-paul-weatherhead/1146141753
Synopsis: During the 19th and early 20th centuries, ghost hoaxes (dressing in a white sheet or a more elaborate costume) and scaring people were rife but seldom studied or written about. These hoaxes frequently led to impromptu ghost hunts by hundreds, sometimes thousands of often drunk vigilantes (and hysterical panics) as rumours of the supposed ghosts would spread round the community.
Many of these ghost scares occurred during the Christmas and New Year periods, and with the publication of "Phantoms of Christmas Past: Festive Ghost Hoaxes, Ghost Hunts and Ghost Panics", Paul Weatherhead explores twelve little known episodes.
Comical but sometimes dark and tragic with entertaining elements of horror and the bizarre, these true Christmas 'ghost' stories combine spooky local legends, mischievous hoaxes, and comical ghost hunts. At the same time, dour psychic investigators compete with whimsical spiritualists and ghost flashmobs.
Critique: Original, exceptional, informative, engaging, "Phantoms of Christmas Past: Festive Ghost Hoaxes, Ghost Hunts and Ghost Panics" by Paul Weatherford is especially and unreservedly recommended for readers with an interest in ghosts, hoaxes, Fortean phenomena, weird histories, and social panics. Given the popularity of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Story' with its own roster of Ghosts (Marley, Christmas's Past, Present, and Future), True Ghost Hunt television shows, and Ghost themed movies, it should be noted for personal reading lists that this paperback edition of "Phantoms of Christmas Past" from 6th Books is also available in a digital book format (Kindle, $7.99).
Editorial Note: Paul Weatherhead (www.paulweatherhead.com) has a longstanding obsession with the weird history of the area leading to the first edition of Weird Calderdale in 2003 which went on to become a local bestseller. His research into Alan Godfrey's alien encounter led to a deeper investigation into the phenomenon, which formed his Master of Arts dissertation about the philosophy of alien abduction.
Pantheon - The Minoans
Laura Perry
Moon Books
c/o Collective Ink Books
https://www.collectiveinkbooks.com
9781803416274, $16.95, PB, 168pp
https://www.amazon.com/Pantheon-Minoans-Laura-Perry/dp/1803416270
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/pantheon-the-minoans-laura-perry/1146416632
Synopsis: The readers of "Pantheon - The Minoans" by Laura Perry will find themselves on a journey through the Labyrinth to meet the Minoan deities of ancient Crete, who are still very much alive in the modern world!
The Minoan family of deities is presided over by a trio of mother goddesses representing the three sacred realms of Land, Sky, and Sea. Readers will become familiar with the names in this pantheon of Minoan Gods, Goddesses, Heroes and Monsters including Ariadne, Dionysus, Rhea, Amalthea -- even Minos, Arachne, and the Minotaur.
From antiquity down to the present day, these deities revealed in the pages of "Pantheon - The Minoans" continue to fascinate us as they draw us into the Labyrinth, the sacred maze that leads us on the adventure of a lifetime.
Critique: A simply fascinating metaphysical and historical study, as well as a truly riveting read from start to finish, "Pantheon - The Minoans" is an impressively informative study that is eloquently written and thoroughly 'reader friendly' in organization and presentation. Informative enhanced for the reader's benefit with an informative Introduction, a four page Glossary, a three page listing of suggested Further Reading, and a seven page Bibliography, "Pantheon - The Minoans" is especially and unreservedly recommended for community and college/university library Minoan History/Culture/Mythology collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists. It should be noted for students, academia, and non-specialist general readers with an interest in the subject that this paperback edition of "Pantheon - The Minoans" from Moon Books is also available in a digital book format (Kindle, $6.99).
Editorial Note: Laura Perry (https://www.lauraperryauthor.com) is an author, artist, and creator who works magic with words, paint, ink, music, textiles, and herbs. She is the founder and Temple Mom of Ariadne's Tribe, an inclusive Minoan spirituality tradition. When she's not busy drawing, writing, or leading rituals and workshops, you can probably find her digging in the garden or giving a living history demonstration at a local historic site. She lives in Woodstock, GA.
Mary Cowper
Reviewer
Micah Andrew's Bookshelf
Apocalyptic Crimes
Donald C. Kramer
Rutgers University Press
https://www.rutgersuniversitypress.org
9781978839342, $74.95, HC, 292pp
https://www.amazon.com/Apocalyptic-Crimes-Nuclear-Abolished-Critical/dp/1978839340
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/apocalyptic-crimes-ronald-c-kramer/1146128074
Synopsis: In 2023, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists set the iconic Doomsday Clock to ninety seconds to midnight -- the closest to midnight, or civilization-ending apocalypse, it has ever been.
Designed at the onset of the Cold War amid new fears of atomic weapons, the Doomsday Clock is a symbolic countdown to annihilation. Now, a generation later, the world is more vulnerable than ever to the nuclear weapons it sought to warn against.
With the publication of "Apocalyptic Crimes: Why Nuclear Weapons Are Illegal and Must Be Abolished", Professor Ronald C. Kramer reconsiders the immense danger these weapons pose to humanity, examining the use, threat to use, and continued possession of nuclear weapons from a criminological perspective.
Professor Kramer argues that any country holding on to its nuclear arsenal (including the United States) is committing a criminal act. Offering a sharp rebuke to the common claim that nuclear stockpiles serve to deter the escalation of conflict, in "Apocalyptic Crimes" Professor Kramer emphasizes the harm caused by the mere possession of these deadly weapons.
He further considers the culpability of political officials, acting as representatives of the state, whose threatening statements about nuclear weapons contain actions or omissions that violate specific international laws. But Professor Kramer also shows how a nuclear apocalypse might be averted and offers a pathway to disarmament.
Through critical analysis and a specific criminology of nuclear weapons, Professor Kramer outlines the political actions necessary to rewind the Doomsday Clock and pull the world back from the brink of destruction -- before the clock strikes midnight.
Critique: Exceptionally well written, organized and presented, as well as essential reading for the general public, anti-war political activists, and governmental policy makers, "Apocalyptic Crimes: Why Nuclear Weapons Are Illegal and Must Be Abolished" by Professor Ronald C. Kramer is an especially and unreservedly recommended addition to community and college/university library Nuclear Weapons/National Security and Warfare Ethics collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists. It should be noted for personal reading lists that this hardcover edition of "Apocalyptic Crimes" from the Rutgers University Press is also readily available in paperback (9781978839335, $29.95) and in a digital book format (Kindle, $29.95).
Editorial Note: Ronald C. Kramer is a professor of sociology at Western Michigan University. His books include Carbon Criminals, Climate Crimes and State-Corporate Crime, both are from Rutgers University Press. (https://wmich.edu/sociology/directory/kramer)
Micah Andrew
Reviewer
Michael Dunford's Bookshelf
Eventually a Sequoia
Jeremy Collins
Mountaineers Books
www.mountaineersbooks.org
9781680518054, $29.95, HC, 224pp
https://www.amazon.com/Eventually-Sequoia-Stories-Adventure-Wisdom/dp/1680518054
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/eventually-a-sequoia-jeremy-collins/1147438292
Synopsis: Based on Jeremy Collins' extensive, art-filled travel journals, "Eventually a Sequoia: Stories of Art, Adventure & the Wisdom of Giants" is part memoir, part environmental manifesto.
Collins, already highly regarded as an artist and climber, was invited to bring his sketchbook on a new kind of adventure: documenting the experiences of those who live along the endangered Amazon River. From there, his art and his curiosity took him to other endangered corners of the world, including the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, the mountains of Nepal, Bears Ears National Monument, and the soaring redwoods of California.
Collins's art-based storytelling captures these experiences in visceral form, from the wonder of passing caribou to the terror of a venomous snakebite. Through it all, he profiles the "sequoias" he meets -- people whose small seeds produce enormous results, like explorer and film director Celine Cousteau, community organizer and educator Prem Kunwar, Ancient Forest Society founder Wendy Baxter, and so many more.
"Eventually a Sequoia" is an inspirational and vivid exploration of the natural world and how it can empower an individual to grow, change, heal, and thrive.
Critique: Original, unique, deftly crafted, expertly illustrated, informative, insightful, thoughtful and thought-provoking, "Eventually a Sequoia: Stories of Art, Adventure & the Wisdom of Giants" by Jeremy Collins is an extraordinary and unreservedly recommended addition to personal, professional, community, and college/university library collections. Part travelogue, part environmental study, part personal memoir, this hardcover edition of "Eventually a Sequoia" from Mountaineers Books is especially recommended reading for anyone with an interest in the combination of art, adventure, environmental conservation, and travel.
Editorial Note: Jeremy Collins (www.jercollins.com) is an artist, climber, and conservation activist. His complex, cerebral, and whimsical drawings and maps have been featured in books, films, and commercial work. From the cover of National Geographic to his award-winning book Drawn: The Art of Ascent, he is a driving force in the outdoor industry. As an activist, he donates his time, voice, and work to causes he believes in. As an athlete, Collins puts up first ascent climbs around the globe and directs a world-renowned 24-hour climbing competition called Horseshoe Hell. Jeremy can be followed online at, on Instagram @jer.collins and Facebook @jeremycollinsart
Michael Dunford
Reviewer
Paul Vogel's Bookshelf
Comrades in Art: Artists Against Fascism 1933-1943
Andy Friend
Thames & Hudson, Inc.
www.thamesandhudsonusa.com
9780500027417, $50.00, HC, 360pp
https://www.amazon.com/Comrades-Art-Artists-Against-1933-1943/dp/0500027412
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/comrades-in-art-andy-friend/1147000768
Synopsis: From the Great Depression to World War II, the lives and work of British artists intersected with a world in crisis. A compelling 'group biography', with the publication of "Comrades in Art: Artists Against Fascism 1933-1943", Andy Friend explores the political forces that shaped the development of modern art in Britain, tracing how artists set aside aesthetic differences to mobilize on an unprecedented scale to resist fascism and campaign for cultural freedom and democracy.
Featuring some of the best-known names in British, European, and American art, such as Barbara Hepworth, Paul Nash, David Bomberg, Pablo Picasso, Oskar Kokoschka, Henry Moore, Stuart Davis, and Diego Rivera, "Comrades in Art" explores the lives of its diverse and talented protagonists.
Taking the first ten years of the Artists International Association (AIA) as his point of focus, the author, Andy Friend, brings to life the captivating drama of the organization as it rapidly grew to attract the support of a majority of Britain's aspiring and established artists, offering new insights into art and culture during this decade of political extremes.
By situating the AIA within a global context, and uncovering connections with Moscow, New York, Paris, Barcelona, and elsewhere, including the New Deal Federal Art Project, "Comrades in Art" is a truly impressive work of research and scholarship -- creating a revealing read for anyone seeking to understand the dynamic interplay of politics and art during one of the most turbulent periods in modern history.
Critique: In the illustrated pages of "Comrades in Art: Artists Against Fascism 1933-1943", Andy Friend tells the story of the European artistic resistance to the rise of fascism before and during World War II. Featuring an informative Foreword and Afterword, "Comrades in Art" also includes a one page listing of Abbreviations, twenty-two pages of Notes, a two page listing of Biographies, a nine page Bibliography, and a seven page Index. A seminal and groundbreaking study, "Comrades in Art" has an impressive relevance to our current art and authoritarian political environment, making it a unique and highly recommended addition to personal, professional, community, and college/university library 20th Century Art & Politics History collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists.
Editorial Note: Andy Friend (https://artuk.org/discover/profile/andy-friend) is an author and curator of "Ravilious & Co: The Pattern of Friendship" and "John Nash: The Landscape of Love and Solace".
Paul T. Vogel
Reviewer
S.A. Gorden's Bookshelf
Decease of Cake (Delaine Baker Cozy Mysteries Book 1)
Patti Larsen
Mayhem and Murder, Ink
9781998948277 $0.00 ebook US, 137 pages
B0CXNCT4HW
https://www.amazon.com/Decease-Cake-Delaine-Baker-Mysteries-ebook/dp/B0CXNCT4HW
Decease of Cake is one of the newer takes on a cozy mystery -- a TV/movie actor becomes involved in a local mystery and uses the skills they learned for the shows to help solve the mystery. Larsen has written a good shorter story introducing her actor/sleuth, Delaine Baker.
Wealthy actress Delaine is newlywed into a rich southern family. She loves her mother-in-law and decides to help make her birthday celebration worth remembering. It is but not in the way Delaine expected. One of the caterers is murdered and found on top of the cake. Delaine decides she has to find the killer to protect her mother-in-law.
Decease of Cake is a nice short cozy mystery read. It feels like an introductory tale for a series and less like a standalone story. If you enjoy books by Larsen or want a new cozy series to read, Decease of Cake is a good recommendation. The book is also a great tale for a short relaxing weeknight read.
Gunning for Trouble (A Jo Gunning Thriller Book 1)
Renee Pawlish
Creative Cat Press
9798360298113, $16.99 paper
B0BGK42PL8 $4.99 ebook, 303 pages
https://www.amazon.com/Gunning-Trouble-Jo-Thriller-ebook/dp/B0BGK42PL8
Gunning for Trouble is a take on the popular retired lone operative wondering the US sub-genre that exploded after the Reacher novels were published.
Ex-Army Civil Affairs specialist Jo Gunning is wondering the streets of Washington DC. A broken op, where a close friend was severely injured, pushed her into retirement. She is not ready to go back home or look for a job. She walks the streets watching people and blending into the background. Jo sees a runaway teen being hassled by a pimp and intervenes. She convinces the teen to go back home and stumbles into a family broken by covert operations. Feeling responsible for the young girl, Jo tries to help and gets pulled into a dangerous dance between government agents and foreign spies.
Gunning for Trouble is an easy recommendation for anyone who likes the Reacher stories and needs a book to fill in between those books. Pawlish's tale is strong enough to stand by itself and is a good addition to this expanding action/thriller sub-genre.
S.A. Gorden
Senior Reviewer
Suzie Housley's Bookshelf
Lucky Enough
K.A. Wesorick
Independently Published
9781967441242, Kindle $8.99, $14.99 PB, 280 pages
https://www.amazon.com/Lucky-Enough-K-Wesorick-ebook/dp/B0F58PRH69
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/lucky-enough-k-a-wesorick/1147224597
Synopsis: Becky ("Becks") is an ordinary teen facing the all-too-familiar difficulties of high school life. Between navigating friendships, dealing with social pressures, and nursing a quiet crush on her classmate Nate, she often feels invisible.
With the support of her best friend, Trina, she sets her heart on making the competitive dance team -- a goal that pushes her to confront her insecurities and find her inner strength.
Her journey takes an unexpected turn when her grandfather gifts her a four-leaf clover necklace. What seems like a simple token of luck quickly becomes a spark for change, guiding Becks through new challenges and opportunities. Along the way, she discovers that resilience, courage, and faith in herself are far more potent than luck alone.
Critique: Lucky Enough is a heartfelt and inspiring novel that captures the universal challenges of adolescence. Becks' story, with its relatable struggles and triumphant moments, will deeply resonate with teens who have ever felt overlooked, as well as with adults who remember their own struggles to belong and grow.
K.A. Wesorick's writing balances whimsy and profound depth, crafting a story that is both entertaining and deeply meaningful. With an authentic voice, she portrays the emotional highs and lows of teenage life - the doubts, the dreams, and the quiet victories that shape who we are becoming.
More than a coming-of-age tale, this book is a thoughtful exploration of identity, resilience, and the courage it takes to step into one's true self. Wesorick's storytelling invites readers to reflect on their own journeys of growth, making Lucky Enough a novel that leaves a lasting impression, lingering well beyond its last page.
Editorial Note: Recommended middle school, highschool, and community library collections for young readers ages 13-18.
Roland Looks for God - Tales of Roland Book 1
Phyllis Wheeler, author
Elzabeth van der Bijl, illustrator
Motherboard Books
https://www.phylliswheeler.com/motherboard-books-where-is-it
B0FJQKNTGB, Kindle $6.99
https://www.amazon.com/Roland-Looks-God-Christian-Picture-ebook/dp/B0FJQKNTGB
Synopsis: Join Roland, a curious little duckling, as he sets out on an unforgettable adventure to discover God in the world's beauty around him. His journey also included challenges that tested his courage, like crafty woodland creatures, shifting friendships, and moments of doubt.
Through it all, Roland learns to see God's hand in creation, and discovers that faith, trust, and genuine friendship can light the path home. Inspired by the words of Psalm 19, this uplifting tale encourages children to marvel at God's world while reflecting on the values that help us grow.
Critique: Roland Looks for God is a delightful and meaningful story that families will want to return to again and again. Roland's quest will captivate young readers, while parents and grandparents will appreciate the faith-filled lessons woven seamlessly into the adventure.
The gentle balance of suspense, heart, and humor makes this an engaging read-aloud choice for children ages 3-8. With its thoughtful message and inviting pace, the book is ideal for sparking conversations about God's creation, courage, and friendship.
Author Phyllis Wheeler and illustrator Elzabeth van der Bijl bring Roland's story to life as a true collaboration of words and art. Wheeler's warm, accessible storytelling draws children into Roland's world, while van der Bijl's tender illustrations capture both the innocence of childhood and the wonder of creation. Together, they create an experience that is as comforting as it is inspiring.
Editorial Note: Recommended for children ages 3-8, this book makes a wonderful addition to family reading time, Sunday school programs, and classroom libraries.
Float
Larry Daley
Bookling Media
https://www.booklingmedia.com
9781954376021, $24.99 PB, 42 pages
https://www.amazon.com/Float-Larry-Daley/dp/1954376022
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/float-larry-daley/1147584477
Synopsis: Join Rosie, a spirited first grader, on a lively adventure as she chases down a mischievous seagull who's run off with her soggy snacks!
The aquarium introduces readers to a dazzling variety of sea life along the way. Keep an eye out for Bubbles the octopus sneaking through the pages, search for the twenty hidden sea turtles in the illustrations, and dive into the bonus pages filled with fun facts about what these fascinating animals love to eat.
Critique: Float is not only a delightful reading experience but also a valuable educational tool. Young readers are sure to giggle, explore, and learn something new about sea life before their next visit to the aquarium.
Author Larry Daley crafts an imaginative tale filled with humor and heart, perfectly capturing the excitement, frustrations, and life lessons of childhood.
This book uses vibrant storytelling and playful details to invite kids to pause, look closely, and discover adventure in unexpected places. It's a journey that sparks curiosity and promotes discovery, making it an exciting read for young minds.
Editorial Note: Recommended reading ages 3-10 years old, Float captivates a wide range of young readers, ensuring that it remains a favorite for years to come. Float will be published on February 3, 2026.
How Shall I Stand Between River & Land? Heart Questions for Uncertain Times
Leni de Mik, PhD
Ingram Spark
9781959921080, $12.99 Kindle, $21.99 PB, 290 pp
https://www.amazon.com/Shall-Stand-Between-River-Land/dp/1959921088
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/how-shall-i-stand-between-river-and-land-leni-de-mik/1147908633
Synopsis: In a world where uncertainty often prevails, searching for guidance and meaning has never felt more urgent. As we navigate the complexities of modern life, many of us long for a more profound sense of purpose and clarity. This is where the journey inward becomes essential -- a reminder that the answers we seek are often quietly waiting within.
Discovering an outlet that allows us to break from routine provides a powerful opportunity to immerse ourselves in new cultures and perspectives and explore a way of different being. As Dr. Leni de Mik reflects, silence is a vital doorway to inner wisdom. In stillness, we find space to truly listen - to our hearts, our values, and the truths that guide us.
Embrace the adventure of self-discovery as you explore yourself and unlock the depths of your own spirit. With each experience, you build the courage to live with greater awareness, compassion, and moral clarity.
So, why hesitate? Let the quiet wisdom within you chart the course for your next incredible journey.
Critique: 'How Shall I Stand Between River & Land?' symbolizes the delicate balance we seek amidst the chaos of life. It's a metaphor for the moments of reflection and exploration that allow us to understand ourselves and our place in the world, a central theme of this book.
In a world that often feels tumultuous and unpredictable, the quest for self-discovery has never been more essential. This book, amidst the fear of war and economic instability, offers a beacon of hope and a roadmap for personal growth and resilience in these troubled times.
Immerse yourself in the enchanting world of Leni de Mik's latest masterpiece, a book that not only invites you to pause amidst the hustle and bustle of life but also promises a transformative journey of self-reflection. It's a journey that will inspire and motivate you to explore the depths of your being.
Each page challenges you to examine not only your own experiences but also your connection to the world around you. This book beautifully illustrates the intricate weaving of our personal journeys into humanity's larger tapestry, thus making you feel connected and part of something bigger. It encourages exploration of our identities and aspirations, cultivating the courage to act wisely and navigate life's moral challenges.
So, why delay? Let the wisdom of your heart guide you on your next adventure and let this book be your companion on the journey of self-discovery.
Please Don't Marry Me: The Alyssa Holt Story
Irene Williams
Independently Published
9781736080344, 3.99 Kindle, $12.99 PB, 252 pages
https://www.amazon.com/Please-Dont-Marry-Me-Alyssa/dp/1736080342
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/please-dont-marry-me-irene-williams/1147933953
Synopsis: Alyssa Holt's story begins under the weight of hardship, with life determined to keep her down. Her world changes when she finds refuge with her loving, faith-driven cousin, Hazel, who offers her the first genuine sense of safety she's felt in years.
Just as Alyssa glimpses the possibility of her dreams coming true, she becomes the target of Tim Bryant - a manipulative man who dismisses her will and disregards her aspirations. With calculated persistence, he seeks to force her into a life she does not want. The emotional journey of Alyssa, her struggles, and her resilience will surely resonate with readers.
What unfolds is a mighty struggle for freedom, justice, and the cleansing of the church from hypocrisy. Through each trial, Alyssa pushes forward - buoyed by the support of loyal friends and her unwavering faith in God.
Critique: Please Don't Marry Me is an interesting and uplifting story of endurance, inner strength, and the determination to take back control of one's life, with faith serving as a guiding light throughout. Each character develops richly, bringing depth and authenticity to this unforgettable read.
Irene Williams writes with a clear purpose, showcasing the skill and professionalism of a gifted author. This heartwarming book leaves a lasting emotional impact, illustrating how faith in God can remove the obstacles that stand between us and our true destiny.
Love a Boll Weevil
Bonnye Matthews
Fathom Publishing
https://www.fathompublishing.com
9781954896291, $8.99 Kindle, 192 pages
https://www.amazon.com/Love-Boll-Weevil-Lessons-Taught-ebook/dp/B0FHFFRFL3
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/love-a-boll-weevil-bonnye-matthews/1147824669
Synopsis: Hear me, O LORD, hear me, that this people may know that thou art the LORD God, and that thou hast turned their heart back again. -- 1 Kings 18:37 King James Version (KJV)
This captivating memoir chronicles the spiritual odyssey of a young girl whose communion with God began in her early years. By the tender age of three, she found it natural to converse with him, often receiving counsel and support through his voice. Despite her mother's disapproval of her prayerful hours, she heeded her faith - a decision she terms as an act of 'holy disobedience.'
As her life unfolded, she experienced the transformative power of God, witnessing her faith being rejuvenated, fortified, and deeply entrenched. One of the most poignant moments in her narrative is her comparing her life to the boll weevil - an often-misunderstood insect with a crucial role and concealed strength. Similarly, she unearthed her purpose and resilience through adversity.
Ultimately, God revealed her mission: to write this book and share her testimony with the world, offering a powerful account of walking in faith and praising him through every chapter of life.
And he said unto them, go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. --
Mark 16:15 King James Version (KJV)
Critique: Love a Boll Weevil is a moving testament to God's presence in the world and his guiding hand in the life of a young girl. Through his words of encouragement, he walked beside her throughout her life's journey, ultimately revealing his purpose in choosing her to share his message.
Bonnye Matthews' writing resonates with the clarity and authority of a divine voice. With each chapter, readers will feel the profound weight of heavenly truths etching themselves into their minds, a testament to the author's divine inspiration. This is a work rich in substance and purpose - one that the world is truly fortunate to receive.
This book has the power not only to strengthen a reader's faith in God but also to guide them toward him for the first time, providing a sense of guidance and support. Few books can touch both mind and heart so profoundly.
A Seal Upon the Heart
Arian Hatefi
Long Drive Press
9798998840326, $26.99 PB, 256 pages
https://www.amazon.com/Seal-Upon-Heart-Arian-Hatefi/dp/B0FKDFNTWF
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-seal-upon-the-heart-arian-hatefi/1147853603
Synopsis: When siblings Leonardo and Leili learn of their father's terminal illness, the grim diagnosis does not deter them. Instead, they vow to do whatever it takes to change the course of his fate. Their unwavering determination leads them to a shadowy corporation rumored to be seeking the mythical Tree of Life. Fueled by hope and a sense of urgency, they embark on a journey to determine if the tree could hold the power to save him -- before time runs out.
As they journey, Leonardo and Leili undergo remarkable inner transformations. They develop a heightened awareness that not only aids them in their quest to locate the tree, if it exists, but also opens the door to possibilities far beyond their imagination.
Critique: A Seal Upon the Heart is an inspiring and thought-provoking tale, blending adventure, philosophical depth, and the enduring force of love. It delves into profound philosophical themes such as life, the power of hope, and the resilience of the human spirit. It beautifully reflects the fragility of life and the unbreakable bonds forged through shared trials.
Arian Hatefi shows remarkable skill, crafting a story rich in heart and meaning. This is a profoundly moving work that resonates long after the last page is turned, leaving readers with a deep emotional connection to the characters and their journey, fulfilled and inspired.
Editorial Note: Ideal for readers ages 8-12.
Parker The Homeless Dog - My First Ever Home
Bob Merz, author
Debbie Hefke, illustrator
Parker the Homeless Dog LLC
ASIN: B0FKLF6945, Kindle $2.99, $17.99 HB, 40 pages
https://www.amazon.com/Parker-Homeless-Book-First-Ever/dp/B0FKLF6945
Synopsis: Parker is a dog who once wandered without a place to call home. Now, a loving household has finally given her the gift of a new beginning.
Yet, she soon tests her joy when she realizes that finding her place isn't as simple as she imagined - struggling with making friends leaves her questioning whether she will ever truly belong.
Readers can also follow Parker's heartfelt journey as she searches for acceptance, love, and a forever family, which mirrors our own struggles.
Critique: Parker The Homeless Dog - My First Ever Home is a tender story that highlights resilience and the deep desire to be loved. Its themes of patience, acceptance, and second chances make it a meaningful read for both children and adults, resonating with the universal human experience.
More than just a tale about a dog, it gently reminds us that every heart needs a place to call home - and that love often requires time and trust to grow.
Author Bob Merz brings Parker's character to life with warmth and sincerity, crafting a story that pulls at the heartstrings while offering hope. The author sensitively portrays each of Parker's struggles, allowing readers to connect with her journey in a genuinely moving way.
Complementing the text, Debbie Hefke's illustrations add depth and charm, capturing the emotion of every moment with her distinctive artistic touch. Together, their work creates a memorable story experience that resonates with people of all ages.
Editorial Note: Recommended for ages 3-8, this book is an ideal choice for family reading, Sunday school lessons, and classroom story time. Its themes of patience, acceptance, and second chances can spark meaningful discussions about these important values, making it a valuable addition to any child's library.
Suzie Housley, Senior Reviewer
https://housleysliteraryservices.com
James A. Cox
Editor-in-Chief
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